


Blue neighbourhood

by peggycarterislife



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, Fake/Pretend Relationship, I Don't Even Know, I hate tags so much, Sharing a Bed, Slow Burn, Witness Protection AU, let’s see how many tropes I can fit into one fic, they’re married, well fake married
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-03
Updated: 2018-10-10
Packaged: 2019-04-17 21:06:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 29,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14197695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peggycarterislife/pseuds/peggycarterislife
Summary: Maggie's placed in witness protection. What happens when Alex is the one to go with her to protect her while pretending to be her wife?





	1. Chapter 1

She drummed her fingers against the stainless steel of the table as her eyes scanned the room for the umpteenth time. They’d left her in here almost thirty minutes ago, and as patient as she was, the steel chair she was sitting on wasn’t exactly the most comfortable thing, plus the guy standing by the door, gun strapped to his thigh and all, wasn’t exactly making it any better.

She wasn’t really nervous. After all she hadn’t done anything bad. Stupid? Yes. Absolutely. But not bad. So she knew she wasn’t really in trouble. Granted, she’d get an earful from her captain but that was nothing out of the ordinary. After all this wasn’t her first time going against her Captain’s orders.

Although this was probably the first time even she recognized how reckless and stupid she was being when she sneaked into one of Maxwell Lord’s labs to record his meeting with Lillian Luthor. She’d been watching them for months, since Lena crossed her mother and project Medusa didn’t go quite to Lillian’s plan.

She’d been keeping an eye on Max way before he started meeting up with Lillian, knowing the size of the guy’s god complex and need to prove himself the best and the smartest.

So it really wasn’t a surprise when Lillian came to him after her daughter’s betrayal. She needed someone smart enough to make isotope 454 for her without questioning her motives, and Lord was just perfect for that.

She though that she did great, the audio recording of the latest meeting- still not enough to put them behind the bars but she was  _ finally _ getting somewhere- in her pocket, as she made her way to the elevator in the underground parking closest to her precinct. That was until she noticed the man walking right towards her, a gun strapped to his side visible when his jacket moved as he walked.

And if it wasn’t for those agents in that black SUV that had turned up out of nowhere, she was sure she would’ve been dead now.

Thirty-one minutes, she noticed when she looked at her watch again. She’d never been a huge fan of the feds and the fact that they were keeping her locked up in this interrogation room when she could’ve been out there doing what she was supposed to do, putting that son of a bitch Max behind the bars and wiping that smug grin off of his face. If she were lucky she could maybe even take Lillian down with him…

So even though she had almost been killed not even an hour ago her mind was buzzing with all the things she was going to do to bring them down when they finally let her out of here.

It wasn’t like she didn’t care for her own life but she was a detective, and protecting lives was why she had joined the police force in the first place. And the fact that there were thousands, maybe even millions- depending on how crazy that Luthor woman really was- lives at stake was totally worth sacrificing her own if she could save them.

Plus it wasn’t like anyone would miss her if that hitman came after her again. Her aunt would be sad, yes, but she’d understand. And besides her, there wasn’t really anyone who would notice that she was even gone. Her captain probably would, and her partner, but that was about it.

The electric lock on the door beeped and the same agent that had brought her in, Vasquez or something Maggie remembered, walked in along with a tall, middle-aged man, who, judging by his attire, was another one of them.  They both gave a curt not to the agent standing by the door and he left the room without a word.

“Detective Sawyer,” the man started, extending his hand to Maggie, “I’m Director J’onzz.”

Maggie took his offered hand into hers, giving him a brief handshake. “Sir.”

Director J’onzz took a seat opposite of her, Vasquez standing next to him. “We’ve been watching you for a while now, Detective, and I must say-“

“Wait,” Maggie cut him off. “The DEO’s been spying on me?”

Vasquez coughed, her eyes wide. “I think you meant the FBI, ma’am.”

“You turned up out of the blue, moments before that guy pulled the trigger, only  _ minutes _ after I got a little too close to finally getting the evidence I need to stop Lillian Luthor from launching a bio weapon that could easily kill earth’s  _ alien _ population.”

Maggie bit back the grin that threatened to spread across her face when she saw the momentary falter in Vasquez’s poker face. “Uh… the FBI does that.”

Vasquez’s voice came out as more of a squeak and Maggie noticed that even the director was biting back a smile.

“It’s okay, Agent Vasquez,” he said. “She deserves to know the truth.

“How’d you figure it out?” Vasquez huffed.

“Well,” she leaned forward in her seat, resting her arms on the table. “I’m a detective, Vasquez, I detect.”

The door beeped again, and another agent walked in. And even though Maggie was too busy being annoyed with this whole organization for keeping her in there when she was supposed to be trying to do everything in her power to stop a freaking genocide, she actually had to make sure her jaw didn’t drop as she took in the woman that walked in.

There was just something about the way she carried herself, the presence that she had brought into the room as she walked in. The way the light in the room seemed to reflect off of her auburn hair and the way her whiskey brown eyes scanned over Maggie. And then there were the thigh holsters, and yeah every agent that Maggie had seen seemed to have them but she had  _ two _ . And Maggie was fairly certain that the gun that was strapped to one of them wasn’t from this planet.

“And she totally saw the huge sign that we have in the command center when the idiot rookies decided that that would be the best way into the interrogation room,” she said, her voice calm but Maggie could hear the sharp undertone, knowing that whoever those guys that had lead her into this room were, they were fucked.

“Well, that was certainly helpful as well,” she said, cocking her head to the side and grinning.

“Oh I’m gonna kill them,” said Vasquez, rubbing her temples.

“I’m sure they’d rather be murdered by you, Agent Vasquez, than have to deal with Agent Danvers,” Director J’onzz said. His face was serious but his eyes gave away the smile he was trying to hold in, and when Maggie glanced to- she assumed- Agent Danvers, she had a similar expression on.

“You know it,” she grinned.

They both shared a look for a few moments and it seemed as if they were communicating with only their eyes. Maggie wondered how well they knew each other, if they’re partners and how many times they’d saved the other’s life. And a tiny part of Maggie’s brain wondered if they were maybe something more. The way they were looking at one another was soft, but it wasn’t the way lovers looked at one another, it was different, more familial.

“Detective Sawyer,” J’onzz turned his attention back to her. “I’d like to introduce you to my best agent, Alex Danvers.” His voice was almost fatherly proud as he introduced her, and Maggie was certain they weren’t together.

She wasn’t even surprised that  _ this _ was his best agent. With the way she carried herself and from what she had gathered from their conversation, this Danvers woman seemed to be quite something.

“Danvers,” she gave a curt nod in the agent’s direction.

“Sawyer.”

“Okay now, all due respect, Director,” Maggie said, folding her hands on the table, “but why am I here, and when will you finally let me go? I have a  _ really _ bad guy to catch.”

“If we let you go out there, those men are going to come after you again, Detective,” he said.

He was right, she knew he was. And it wasn’t like she didn’t care about her own life at all but there were lives of thousands of others at stake and she was willing to take the risk.

She shrugged. “Occupational hazard.”

He didn’t say anything for a moment, just stared at her silently and Maggie felt as if he could see right through her.

“There’s a very thin line between being brave and being stupid,” he said finally, making Agent Danvers scoff. “I don’t think you’re the one to laugh now, Alex.”

The agent frowned, folding her arms across her chest, looking almost like a chastised child. And Maggie would’ve laughed at the fact that the woman who marched into the room a few minutes ago, looking like she could take down anyone with just one look, was almost honest-to-god pouting right now if her mind wasn’t set on a much more important issue.

“So what now? I can’t continue my investigation?”

“I’m afraid that even if you did, and you gathered enough evidence to bring Max and Lillian down, the PD wouldn’t stand a chance against their army of lawyers,” said Danvers.

Maggie shrugged. “It’s worth the try.”

The tough agent was back again, her features hard as she frowned down at Maggie. “It’s stupid and you know it.”

“He’s figured out how to make the isotope, Danvers,” she said. “It’s only a matter of time till he actually makes it.”

“I know. We listened to your recording,” Danvers nodded. “That’s why we’re gonna take over from here while you’re placed in witness protection for your own safety until  _ we _ make sure they get what they deserve.”

“There’s no fucking way I’m letting you feds take over my case! Not when I’m so close to-“

“Getting yourself killed?”

“Oh shut it, Danvers,” Maggie snapped.

“Agents Danvers is right,” J’onzz said. “It’s better if we take it from here.”

She set her jaw tight and swallowed her pride. “At least let me work with you.”

“You’d only be a liability,” Danvers said.

Maggie stood up from her seat, the metal of the chair screeching against the floor, and planted her hands on the table firmly. “A liability?” she huffed. “This is  _ my _ case. I’ve been working on it for  _ months _ . I know it like the back of my hand!”

“We know everything that you do, Detective,” said the Director. “When I told you we’ve been watching you for a while, I meant because of the case.”

“Oh do you, now?”

“Unless there’s something you didn’t write down or record,” he said. “Is there something that we should know?”

Maggie clenched her jaw, trying to decide what to do. She knew that the right thing would be to just tell them but she couldn’t bring herself to just hand the information, she’d worked  _ so hard _ to get, to some cocky feds who’d take all the credit. Not that she did it for the validation, far from it, but she wasn’t a big fan of people, especially feds, stealing her cases, especially almost solved.

“What are you not telling us, Detective?” J’onzz asked, his voice calm.

Maggie looked into his eyes and, again, felt as if he could see right through her. She wondered if this is what the people she interrogates feel like.

“Detective?”

“J’onn just-“

“No, Alex,” his voice was firm and so were his eyes when he looked over at the agent. She just nodded, her shoulders slumping for a moment before she straightened up again, fixing Maggie with a hard stare.

She sank back down in her chair. “They’re not gonna use the isotope just yet.”

Danvers frowned. “What?”

“I don’t know if you know anything about Lord,” she said, noticing how Danvers grimaced as she nodded and huffed out a quiet ‘ _ Unfortunately.’  _ “The guy gets off on being the greatest. I overheard some of his lab assistants on my way out… They said he wants to perfect Medusa.”

“Perfect it?”

“They wanna get rid of all the aliens…” Maggie said, looking at the three agents across from her.

Danvers’ eyes went wide. “Medusa doesn’t work on Kryptonians,” she breathed.

J’onzz was up from his seat in an instant, his hands on Alex’s shoulders as he tried to find her eyes with his. Maggie turned her eyes away from the two of them, noticing that Vasquez did the same, the scene in front of her feeling far too intimate. And she also tried not to listen to their conversation which, to be fair, was frankly quite impossible in the quiet of the interrogation room.

“Hey, look at me Alex,” he said. “We won’t let anything happen to her. I promise.”

“I just, I… the stakes were pretty high before but now that  _ she’s  _ in danger as well I… I can’t even stand the thought of something happening to her, J’onn.”

“I know. But nothing’s going to happen, okay? We’re gonna stop Max and then we’re gonna find Lillian and stop Cadmus once and for all.”

“Okay.”

Maggie heard the chair screech as the director pulled it back a bit to sit back down and finally looked up from her hands.

“Okay so, I need you to walk us through everything you know, Detective,” he said and Maggie nodded, albeit a bit reluctantly. “And then we’ll discuss the details of your witness protection placement, okay?”

She sucked in a deep breath. “Okay.”

~ ~ ~

She told them everything. Every single detail. Walked them through her hand written notes that were honestly a mess to anyone but her. And she hated every moment of it because she managed to gather all of this information on her own, and now she was handing it over to them just like that.

But the rational part of her brain knew that it was the right thing to do.

There was no way she could put Max Lord behind the bars or find Lillian Luthor or bring CADMUS down on her own, she knew that. She knew the Director was right. And yet it did nothing to make her hate this whole organization any less.

After she had walked them through the case Agent Vasquez left the room to get the papers for the next part, the part that Maggie was dreading even though she knew it was the right thing to do.

“Think of it as a vacation, Sawyer,” Danvers grinned, leaning back in the chair that an agent had brought for her about an hour ago.

Maggie had to use all her willpower not to flip the agent off. Instead she just clenched her jaw and plastered the best smile she could muster in that moment over her face.

Vasquez came back with multiple files and Maggie could already feel her hand hurting from all the signing she knew was ahead of her. Dropping the files on the table, Vasquez excused herself and left the room again, leaving Maggie with J’onzz and Danvers.

The Director picked up one of the files and handed it over to Maggie. “First I’ll need you to sign an NDA, Detective.”

She took the file from his hand and opened it, quickly reading through the couple of pages that she found inside. When she was done she scrawled her signature on the places that were marked and slid the closed file back to J’onzz.

“Okay now let’s get onto the fun part,” he said, cracking a small smile.

He picked another one of the files that were in front of him and handed it over to Maggie. She opened it up right away and started reading when Danvers’ voice caught her attention and made her head snap back up.

“You can’t be serious, J’onn.”

Her jaw was set tight and her eyes were full of anger and, yeah, Maggie could totally see why those poor rookies would rather be murdered than have to deal with her. Because if this was what she looked like when her superior pissed her off, Maggie couldn’t imagine what she looked like when it was someone with a lower rank.

“She needs the best we’ve got, Alex,” he said. “And that’s you. Plus we need someone we know we can trust.”

“But we could, uh… what about Vasquez?”

“Vasquez is good but she’s a much better tech than a field agent. But if it comes down to it and they find her, she’ll need our best soldier.”

“But J’onn, her life is in danger!” Maggie could see how Danvers’ throat bobbed as she swallowed thickly. She knew they weren’t talking about her anymore. “I, I need to be here for her! I need to stop them before they hurt her! I need to-“

“Alex,” he cut her off. “Nothing will happen to her, I promise. I know you want to stay here but right now I need you to make sure that nothing happens to Detective Sawyer.”

“We have a base full of highly trained agents,” she wasn’t yelling anymore, her voice weak, almost defeated.

“And I need my best one on this.”

“J’onn-“

“You and I both know you’d do something stupid, Alex,” he said. “And I know how much you love her and that you’d do anything for her, but I need you somewhere else, okay? I hate to say this but you’d only be a liability, Alex.”

Maggie averted her eyes as Danvers clenched her jaw again and took in a deep, ragged breath.

She wondered who this woman Danvers was so crazy about was. She felt stupid now about how she thought that these two could be together, those two thigh holsters and the way she carried herself should’ve been a dead giveaway.

She tried to swallow that tiny bit of irrational jealousy she felt towards whoever could make this supposedly top notch agent go so crazy and focused on the file document in front of her.

She heard Danvers sigh out a defeated ‘ _ Okay.’  _ before she completely tuned out her surroundings, focusing just on the paper in front of her. If she really had to do this, she was going to do what she knew best, do what she had to do to survive and do her part of the job right. 

~ ~ ~

Maggie watched as Danvers paced the length of the office they were now in, her jaw clenched tight, fists balled at her sides. She knew that it wasn’t the best thing, being told that you’re going to spend fuck knows how long pretending to be someone else and living with a stranger, but she was going through the same thing and the agent’s sulkiness was starting to get to her.

Granted, she had that girl of hers to worry about and Maggie didn’t really have anyone, but it she was still being placed in the witness protection pretty much against her own will, unable to continue her own investigation.

She sighed, sinking deeper into the cushions of the couch she was sat on. “Think of it as a vacation, Danvers,” she said, repeating the agent’s line from earlier, a shit-eating grin on her face.

Danvers stopped dead in her tracks, turning to face Maggie, and Maggie saw, not for the first time that day, why the agent was so feared around here. Refusing to shrink under her gaze, she crossed her arms across her chest, cocking her head to the side while still keeping the smile on her face.

She lifted one of her hands, pointing a finger at Maggie, and took a deep breath. Her eyes were hard but Maggie could see she was considering what to say. Danvers sighed, her shoulders slumping a little.

“I guess I deserved that,” she said before resuming her pacing.

Maggie watched her for a moment before speaking up again, “Come on, I make a great company.” She knew she probably wasn’t anywhere as great as the agent’s girlfriend, but she had to at least try to get the other woman to stop being so broody.

“Do you now?”

Maggie nodded. “You’re gonna miss me when all this is over.”

Danvers stopped her pacing again, looking at Maggie with eyes that were just a little less irritated but Maggie still considered it a success.

“Can I pick what name I’m gonna use?”

“I’m sure if you ask nicely enough, J’onn won’t have any objections,” Danvers replied. Her brow furrowed as she looked at Maggie studiously, a crinkle forming between her eyes. “Why?”

“Well, you know what they say,” Maggie shrugged, “when life gives you lemons…”

“Sawyer?”

Maggie tilted her head a little, trying to put on her most serious face. “Do I look like a Regina Phalange?”

“Oh my god.”

She watched as Danvers rubbed her forehead, not missing the way that a corner of her mouth twitched as she suppressed a smile.

“Really, Sawyer? A Friends reference?”

“You did catch it though so…”

Danvers squinted her eyes and Maggie knew she was trying to throw her  _ the glare _ – the one that made the poor agent who’d brought them lunch crash into the door frame on his way out- but it wasn’t really working this time since her eyes were shining with poorly hidden amusement.

“I’m  _ so _ not letting Kara pick the next thing we binge,” she muttered under her breath before the door swung open and Director J’onzz walked in, holding two files in his hands.

Maggie had been working as a police officer for nearly a decade, but she’d never seen so many files in her life. Her wrist was already sore from signing NDAs and filling some forms in and then some more signing.

He handed each of them one file. “These are your new identities,” he said, taking a seat next to Maggie. “Read them and try to memorize as much as you can. You have twenty four hours.”

“Okay,” she said, nodding, as Danvers opened her file.

“Winn’s already started on your IDs and backgrounds,” he said. “Just check in with him in about two hours for the names and dates of birth and all that.”

She had no idea who this Winn person was but if he could create a whole background for her fake self all by himself, he must’ve been really good. Granted, this whole organization seemed like the FBI on pure cocaine so she imagined skills like that were pretty much required.

She nodded and opened her own file. It felt like she read and reread the first couple of lines like a hundred times. Her brain was too tired at this point, it felt as if the events of the day had finally caught up with her and her eyelids literally started drooping.

She clenched her jaw, and tried chewing on the insides of her cheeks to keep her eyes open, but it didn’t do much. Her brain was still refusing to cooperate with her eyes. She glanced at her watch and noticed it had been more than four hours since the last time she’d checked. She could  _ really _ use a coffee.

“If you’d like, Detective,” J’onzz’s voice made her look up from the file, “you can take a little break. I’ll have someone bring you some coffee.”

She smiled gratefully. “Thank you.”

The Director nodded and stood up, walking over to the door. “You want anything, Alex?”

Danvers didn’t even look up from her file, “No, thanks I’m good.”

“You know Kara’s not gonna be happy you’re not eating.”

“Yeah, yeah,” she waved him off, rolling her eyes.

“The usual sound good?” he asked.

“Perfect.”

“Okay,” he said, his hand on the handle. “I’ll be right back.”

He opened the door but before he could leave Danvers stopped him, yelling ‘ _ Wait!’ _ , her eyes, almost comically wide, still glued to the file. He turned around, closing the door, a concerned frown on his face.

“Something wrong, Alex?”

“What- I, uh, I just… What do you-uh,” she took a deep breath, finally meeting his eyes. She pointed a finger between herself and Maggie. “We’re, uh, _ married? _ ”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know i said i'd update next week but i keep rewriting this and adding stuff and i have it ready so why keep you guys waiting

Maggie just sat there, watching Danvers’ wide-eyed look, wondering why she was so freaked out by the fact that their alter egos were married.

“Do you have a problem with that, Agent Danvers?”

Danvers swallowed, looking down at the file she was holding in her hands, and shook her head. “I, uh, no, sir.”  

He drew in a deep breath, looking as if he wanted to say something, but then he just turned around and left the room, leaving the two of them alone.

Danvers walked over to the couch, flopping down on the opposite end. She brushed her fingers through her hair, breathing in deeply. Maggie averted her eyes, looking down at the file in her hands, trying to pretend she was reading.

She tried to make sense of Danvers’ reaction. Just a few moments ago she would bet that the woman was gay, but the way she reacted… Although it might’ve been because of Danvers’ girl. If she was really _that_ crazy about her, Maggie could imagine that pretending to be someone else’s wife wasn’t really the greatest thing.

“Okay, so, uh… we’re married,” Danvers laughed awkwardly.

Maggie offered her a weak half-smile as she looked up. “I guess we are.”

“Just so you know, I’m not homophobic.”

“Didn’t think you were, Danvers.”

The agent got quiet after that again and so Maggie tried to get back to reading the file. Her brain couldn’t even process the first couple of lines when Danvers spoke up again.

“I just, my reaction before, I-“

“I get it, Danvers.” She didn’t. “Don’t worry about it.”

She nodded, looking down to the file that she was holding in her hands and Maggie thought that she’d finally be able to learn at least a little bit about her new persona. But then Danvers was talking again before she could even open the damn file.

“Do you maybe wanna quiz each other later?”

Maggie frowned. “Quiz each other?”

“Yeah, you know, from all the,” she lifted her own file, waving it a little.

Maggie couldn’t help the amused grin that spread across her face. “Nerd.”

“I just like being prepared!”

“Okay, Danvers.”

“Listen,” Danvers shuffled a bit closer to her, straightening up as she did so, and Maggie was really curious to hear what would come out of her.

But then the door flung open and even though she was holding her file in her hands, the strong burst of wind pulled a couple of the pages out, scattering them across the room. There was a split second where Maggie felt the most confused since she’d been brought into the DEO, since there were no windows in the office so the strong current of wind honestly made no sense to her.

And after that split second her eyes landed on _her_ , and her jaw went slack. Because as annoying as Supergirl was whenever she did the PD’s job for them and made a huge mess in the process, Maggie was still only a human- and a very gay one at that, even though the whole girl scout thing that Supergirl had going on wasn’t really her thing.

“Oh my god, Alex!” The superhero pulled the agent to her feet, not even noticing Maggie’s presence as she crushed her in a hug- Maggie could literally hear the Danvers’s spine popping. “I just heard… Are you, are you okay?”

Maggie just sat there, not knowing what to do. She watched as Danvers positively melted into the hug- despite the fact that it seemed to be way too hard. She watched as Supergirl scanned Alex’s face with wide, concerned eyes when she pulled back from the hug, and the way that Danvers seemed to be clinging onto the superhero’s arms as if her life depended on it, and the way they seemed to be communicating with only their eyes.

And suddenly it hit her.

Supergirl was the girl Danvers was so crazy about. No wonder she had freaked out so bad when Maggie told them about Lord’s plan to perfect Medusa, her girl’s life was in danger. And no wonder J’onzz had called her a liability, if Luthor got a hold of her, Supergirl would surely do anything to get the agent back. So having Danvers placed in the safe house with her wasn’t only for her own protection, it was also for the agent’s and Supergirl’s.

And no wonder Danvers had freaked out about having to pretend to be married to Maggie. She was with the Girl of Steel after all, Maggie couldn’t even begin to compare herself with the hero, and Danvers surely didn’t want to lose her.

Yeah, it all made sense now.

“Sawyer,” Danvers’ voice pulled her out of her musings.

She looked up at the two women standing in front of her, still close enough that their shoulders were brushing. “Huh?”

“Supergirl here,” Danvers pointed to the hero, “was just thanking you for the amazing work you’ve done.”

“Oh,” Maggie breathed. “It’s my job.”

“I heard you went against your Captain’s orders, Detective,” Supergirl said, putting her hands on her hips.

“Yeah,” Maggie nodded, her eyes widening in realization. “Fuck, I’ll probably be getting suspended when this is over…”

Danvers nodded. “Probably.”

“Alex!” Supergirl hissed, elbowing the agent.

Danvers swatted the superhero’s arm, rubbing her ribs with her other hand. “What? It’s true!”

“It’s not a nice thing to say!”

“She disobeyed her Captain’s orders!”

“It’s not like you don’t do it all the time…”

Danvers scoffed. “That’s different!”

“How?”

“I’m J’onn’s second in command.”

Supergirl crossed her arms across her chest. “He’s still your superior.”

“But-“

“No, Alex,” Supergirl cut her off.

Danvers turned to face Maggie, with an honest to god pout on her face, and Maggie had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep herself from laughing.

“Anyways,” Supergirl started, “I appreciate what you’ve done for the alien community, Detective.”

Maggie went to say something when the hero poked Danvers in the ribs with her elbow again. She rolled her eyes, sighing dramatically. “Thank you, Detective.”

Maggie chuckled, shaking her head. Something seemed off about their relationship. Maggie wasn’t an expert when it came to all that relationship crap but she’d never seen a couple act like… _that_. Especially not when one of them was about to leave for god knows how long. But she shrugged the odd feeling off. Who was she to judge someone else’s relationship after all?

~ ~ ~

After drinking her coffee and eating the tiramisu that the Director had brought her- how he knew exactly what her comfort food was, was beyond her- she finally dived into the file, trying to absorb as much as she could.

They were apparently going to be transferred to some small, suburban town in New York. The two of them had apparently been married for almost two years and moved to the suburbs because they wanted a quieter life, maybe even start a family.

(And in all honesty, the mere thought of all of that made her feel sick.)

The fact that she was going to work as a high school librarian didn’t exactly make her feel any better.

She just hoped that they’d find Luthor as soon as possible.

Having read the file several times, Maggie headed to the command center- where Danvers had told her she’d find that Winn guy.

She scanned the command center, looking for ‘ _That one guy who looks like he got lost on his way from the comic shop.’_ , as Danvers had described him. It wasn’t really hard, considering he was the only person she’d seen around here, except for Supergirl, who wasn’t wearing that ridiculous black uniform, and his desk was littered with toys.

“Winn Schott?” she asked as she walked up to him.

He spun around in his chair, facing the Detective with a confused frown. “Detective Sawyer?”

“Yep.”

“Wait,” his frown deepened, “how come they just let you walk around here alone?”

“Danvers said it wouldn’t make any harm since I’ve already been here, thanks to the _idiot rookies that are gonna regret being born_ ,” she said, putting air quotes around the last part. “Plus she said that she’d know if I snooped around here and that I’d end up in a containment cell for the rest of my life.”

His frown was replaced with a kind smile as he nodded. “Sounds like our Alex.” He pulled an empty chair over, patting it. “Come on, sit.”

Maggie sat down next to him and watched as he typed away on the keyboard, wondering how many people had the privilege of calling Danvers ‘ _our Alex’_ in _that tone_ without being threatened with some horrible, painful death.

“Okay so,” he said after a while, “I have pretty much everything done, I just need a picture that we can use for your ID.”

“Oh, just use-“

“No,” he cut her off, smiling somewhat apologetically. “You see, I can’t use any pictures of Maggie Sawyer…”

She frowned. “I don’t think I’m following.”

“We need to give you a makeover, Sawyer.”

“Oh,” she breathed.

Maggie wondered if the panic rising inside of her chest was reflected in her eyes. Judging by the way Schott was looking at her, it was. Granted, might’ve also been the way her mouth was just hanging open.

“No, no, no, don’t worry,” he said, reaching out to touch her shoulder reassuringly but changing his mind before he could do so. “Nothing too drastic, and I promise it’ll look good.”

“Don’t really have a choice, do I?”

“Nope,” Schott shook his head. “But hey, at least you’re in good hands,” he said, a big smile on his face.

She cocked an eyebrow. “Am I?”

He sat up straighter, puffing his chest out a little. “You’re looking at the guy who made Supergirl’s suit, and also,” he leaned in closer, lowering his voice a little, “Guardian’s. So yeah, you’re in the very best h-“

She stopped listening after he’d mentioned Guardian. Yeah, the guy turned out to be pretty okay, but she still wasn’t very fond of vigilantes. A good majority of her precinct wasn’t. “You know who Guardian is?”

Schott’s eyes bugged out, his mouth opening and closing a few times before he found his voice again. “That’s, that’s, that’s not the point right now,” he stuttered out.

“But you do know.”

“Yes and I’m not telling you anything,” he said as he stood up from his chair. “Now come on, let’s make you look more like Mia Knight and less like Maggie Sawyer.

“Who’s Mia Knight?”

“You.”

~ ~ ~

“Okay you have to remember that this is temporary.”

She was sitting in a chair, in what she presumed was somebody’s office, a towel around her shoulders so the hair that he’d cut wouldn’t fall under her shirt, and that the peroxide he’d used wouldn’t ruin her clothes.

“Also remember that this is Mia’s styling choice and that she’s a _very_ different person than Maggie.”

She watched as he wrung his hands together, his face paler by the second.

“Oh and, I’m a federal agent and killing me would get you into a lot of trouble,” he added before handing Maggie his phone- they’d taken hers when she got here- with the front camera on.

“Jesus Christ, Schott.”

Her hair was shorter than before, but not too short, it still reached below her shoulders. She had to admit the cut was really nice. But then there was the… thing he did with the peroxide.

“I’m sorry.”

“Is that supposed to be an ombré?” she asked, her eyes still glued to the phone.

“I tried?”

It didn’t really seem like he did since her hair looked as if she just dipped good two inches of it into peroxide. She had two inches of bleached blonde hair and then it just cut straight into her own color.

She took a deep breath to quell the panic rising inside of her chest.

This was Mia Knight, not Maggie Sawyer. The DEO would find and stop Luthor soon and she would dye her hair back. Or maybe just cut the tips off, she thought as she ran her fingers through her hair, feeling how uncharacteristically dry the ends felt.

“If you wanted frosted tips you should’ve cut it shorter,” Danvers’ voice pulled her out of her thoughts.

She rolled her eyes and with a heavy sigh she looked away from the screen. Danvers was leaning against the doorframe, a smug grin on her face.

“Oh come on, Alex,” Schott pouted. “I swear I tried! It’s actually much harder than it looked in that YouTube tutorial!”

Maggie’s eyes went wide. “You said you knew what you were doing, Schott,” she said, taking a slow deep breath.

“I, I, I did…”                                          

Danvers shut the door behind her and took a seat on the couch. “Winn she looks like the long lost member of NSYNC.”

“No, she doesn’t!” he whined. “You look… okay, Detective.”

Maggie leaned forward, rubbing her forehead with her fingers, trying to get herself to calm down, to remind herself that this was only temporary. This wasn’t her, this was Mia Knight. She tried to think about that, and to push down the fact that not only had these people stolen her case, but they’d messed her hair up as well.

And now Danvers was making fun of her. Not that Maggie was a touchy person, far from it, but it had been way too much for one day. Pretending to be married to this pain-in-the-ass agent was going to be… interesting.

“You know who you re-“

“Shut it, Danvers,” she cut her off, straightening up so she could look at the agent. “Remember, we’re going to live together for the foreseeable future, and I’m honestly _this close_ to suffocating you with a pillow while you sleep.”

“Fair enough,” Danvers nodded, putting her hands up in surrender. “Sorry.”

Maggie gave her a small nod, handing the phone back to Schott as she stood up. “Okay so, if you’re done with me, I’m gonna go learn some things about Mia.”

“Yeah, go,” he nodded, giving her a brief but kind smile.

“Make sure to get some rest, Sawyer,” said Danvers, “Tomorrow’s moving day.”

~ ~ ~

She didn’t feel like she got any rest at all. The cot she slept on wasn’t exactly comfortable, plus she stayed up late, trying to learn every single detail about her and Danvers’ new personas. She fell asleep around 2am, and got woken up by Vasquez only three hours after that.

She sat up, stretching her back until she heard a couple of satisfying pops. “Is it time?” she asked, getting a curt nod from the agent in return.

“I brought you some clothes, ma’am,” she pointed at the neatly folded pile on one of the other cots. “I’ll wait for you outside so you can change.”

“Okay,” she breathed and then she was alone again.

She kicked the blanket off shivering slightly as the cold air hit her bare legs- she’d slept in her shirt and underwear since she had no pajamas to change into. She padded over to the other bed, and pulled on the clothes Vasquez had left there for her.

She frowned when she zipped up her jeans, discovering they fit perfectly, but at this point there was nothing this organization could do that would surprise her. The flannel was a little too big but she just tucked it in and rolled the sleeves up.

Running a hand through her hair, she went to grab her phone from the back pocket to check if she looked presentable just to realize that it wasn’t there. She’d been barely awake for five minutes and the level of her irritation was already rising.

She folded her own clothes neatly, leaving them in the same spot she took the new ones from, and after making the cot she’d slept in, she exited the room, clutching the file in her hands.

“You’ll have to leave that here, ma’am,” she said, pointing to the file.

Of course she had to leave it here.

After leaving the file right next to her clothes, Vasquez led her through what felt like a maze of hallways. Maggie had a great sense of direction, but if Vasquez had left her in one of the hallways, she was pretty sure she’d get lost. At times she felt as if they were walking in circles, and it made her wonder if Vasquez did that on purpose or if it was her tired brain, unable to catch up with what was happening around her yet.

In the end they arrived to an elevator, and Vasquez pressed the up button. They waited in silence for a few moments, and as they waited Maggie went over everything she’d learned last night. She didn’t see Danvers after she’d left the office after her makeover, and now she kind of felt like the quiz that Danvers had mentioned wouldn’t have been the worst idea. She felt like she knew absolutely nothing.

The elevator door opened, pulling her out of her thoughts. She snapped her head up, seeing that there already were people in the elevator, the Director and some blonde woman dressed almost like a suburban mom, with that baby blue sweater and light jeans, her head down as she typed something on her phone.

“Detective,” J’onzz greeted her with a small nod of his head.

And then the woman’s head snapped up and holy shit it was Danvers. And she was wearing glasses and Maggie had thought about how she’d make fun of her- not that Maggie was a vengeful person- but Danvers’ eyes were wide and somehow vulnerable almost, and even if she tried she couldn’t make fun of _this_.

Because, safe for the clothes, Danvers looked hot. The red hair did look better on her than blonde but she still looked hot. Even the whole suburban mom thing didn’t look so bad on her. She actually looked good. Kind of softer, somehow. More vulnerable.

“Danvers, you look…” amazing, she wanted to say, but her brain was apparently still too tired to form sentences so she didn’t say anything, instead she just gaped at her as she stepped into the elevator.

“Blonde?” Danvers offered with a nervous chuckle.

“Blonde,” Maggie nodded, smiling. “But it suits you.”

Danvers’ eyes went wide for a moment before she let out a quiet, “Thanks.”

The elevator opened in a second, and Maggie stepped out on… the roof. They were on the roof and her stomach was suddenly in knots because there was nothing she hated more than heights- maybe except for the jokes people made about how she’s so scared of heights because she’s so tiny.

She sucked in a deep breath, and followed the group over to the freaking helicopter that was apparently waiting for the two of them.

“Here,” said J’onzz as they reached the helicopter, handing Maggie a cellphone. “You have all the numbers you’ll need saved in there. You know the rules, don’t contact anyone else and don’t post any pictures of yourself.”

Maggie nodded, taking the cellphone from the Director gratefully, and stuffed it in her back pocket.

“Oh and one more thing,” he said, reaching into his pocket again. He pulled out two simple silver bands, handing one to each of them.

Maggie slipped the ring onto her finger, looking at her own hand. It looked strange, felt strange. Almost as if it wasn’t her own hand.

But she had no time to think about that because it was time to go.

She waited while Danvers hugged J’onzz, trying to look anywhere but the two of them, the moment feeling too personal. After saying her goodbyes Danvers hopped into the helicopter with ease. Maggie shook the Director’s hand, hoping he didn’t feel her the slight tremble in her hand, before following Danvers.

She got in on shaky legs, hoping she wasn’t as pale as she thought she was. She didn’t want anyone to know that she was this terrified. But of course Danvers noticed as she was putting on her helmet, because her damn hands just _had to_ be trembling so hard. Maggie gave her a weak smile, trying to cover it up, but she knew that Danvers just _knew_.

She was trained to notice things after all. Even the smallest, most insignificant things that most people would never pay attention to. So of course she noticed the way Maggie’s hands trembled and how it took five tries for her to finally fasten the damn buckle and how, she was sure, she went pale the moment they stepped out of the elevator and onto the roof.

“Donovan,” she said, pulling the attention of the agent.

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Swap seats with me,” she said, moving to sit in the front.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Danvers made her way to the front of the helicopter, and strapped herself in. She looked over her shoulder at Maggie, giving her a warm smile as she patted the seat next to her.

“Care to join me, Sawyer?”

“Nah, I’m good.”

She really didn’t need to have a better view.

“Come on,” Danvers insisted, so with a deep breath Maggie unbuckled herself from the seat and sat in the one next to Danvers, fastening the belt in her new seat as tightly as she could, as if that would help her if they were to crash.

She gripped the edges of her seat so hard her knuckles went white when Danvers started up the engine, barely breathing.

“Do you remember how Supergirl came out?” Danvers asked out of nowhere.

Of course she remembered. That damn plane almost crashed right in the middle of National City. But why Danvers was reminding her of that now was beyond her.

“Yeah,” she breathed.

“Do you know why she saved that plane?”

Maggie looked over at her with a frown. “Because a lot of people would’ve died?” she said slowly.

“No,” Danvers shook her head. “Well, yes. But no.”

Maggie watched as Danvers started pushing different buttons on the control board and her stomach clenched even more, knowing that they’d take off soon. She could already hear the propeller.

“Okay… why?”

“Because I was on that plane,” she said and Maggie didn’t miss the way her jaw clenched as she said it.

“Oh.”

Well of course the hero wouldn’t have left her girlfriend to die.

“And I hated even the thought of flying after that. I knew that she’d do anything to catch me if something like that were to happen again, but I just… hated it so much” she said. Maggie noticed the way she said she _hated_ flying instead of saying that she was scared. Of course the big bad federal agent Danvers would be too proud to admit she was scared of something. “But then I realized I didn’t mind it as much when I was the one flying, when I was responsible. Because I trusted myself.”

“You suggesting I become a pilot, Danvers?” Maggie laughed nervously.

“No,” she said. “I’m just asking you to trust me.”

“There’s nothing I hate more than heights,” she confessed. “I don’t know if I can…”

“Well you should,” Danvers replied with a grin.

Maggie frowned. “Yeah?”

“Yeah because your life kinda depends on me ya know…”

Maggie swatted her on the shoulder lightly. “Hey!”

“But also,” she added, looking over at Maggie, “because I’m a damn good pilot.”

“Are you now?”

“Yep,” Danvers nodded. “We’ve been in the air for like three minutes and I’m pretty sure you haven’t noticed.”

Maggie’s eyes went wide as she looked away from Danvers’ smug face to look out of the window. They really were in the air. She let herself relax into the seat a bit, trying to not concentrate on how high they were.

And Danvers seemed to just somehow know she needed a distraction so she talked to her the whole way. They even quizzed one another, and Maggie found out that she actually remembered more than she’s thought she did.

And as they landed a few miles from New York, somewhere in the middle of nowhere in Pennsylvania, where the DEO had left a car for them, she thought that maybe, just maybe, this whole ‘fake married to a federal agent’ thing wasn’t going to be so bad after all.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kudos and comments are amazing! i always love to hear what y'all think so please, leave a comment or come talk to me on tumblr, [peggycarterislife](http://peggycarterislife.tumblr.com/)


	3. Chapter 3

They took turns driving and talked some more. And the more they talked, the less of an ass Danvers seemed to be. Maggie got to know that she wasn’t only an agent but also a scientist and a huge nerd and that she hated the blonde hair because it reminded her of her mother. And even though she was curious, Maggie didn’t ask Danvers anything about her mother, knowing better than most people how complicated family relationships could be.

Maggie was more than disturbed when she found out that Danvers liked pineapple on pizza and Danvers didn’t bother to hide her disgust when Maggie told her that she liked her ice cream vegan even though she wasn’t a vegan.

The conversation between them flowed easily, to Maggie’s surprise, and she tried to stay awake to get to know the woman better, but Danvers must’ve noticed the way her eyes were drooping and her words slurring and told her to get some sleep. That she didn’t mind driving the rest of the way.

She woke up to Danvers’ hand on her shoulder, telling her that they were there. She sat up straight and winced, cursing herself for having fallen asleep with her head against the window. Stretching her back till she heard a couple of satisfying pops when she got out of the car, she took in the place that would be her home for god knows how long.

It was a nice house, a little bit on the small side but it looked like the kind of house someone with their jobs could afford. Looking on the houses down the streets, she saw that they all looked pretty similar to theirs. The whole neighborhood had this family vibe, and it totally looked like the kind of place where people would want to bring up their kids.

“Shit,” she heard Danvers curse as she got out of the car. “It’s cold.”

“It’s like 50 degrees,” she frowned. Honestly what was she expecting at the end of November?

She laughed as the agent pulled her sweater tighter around herself, shooting Maggie a glare. “I’m from California, okay?”

Biting her cheek to keep herself from laughing any more, she made her way to the trunk to grab the bags with clothes that the DEO had left for them there, while Danvers searched for the keys.

“Let me help you,” she offered, pointing to one of the bags that Maggie had slung over her shoulder.

“Nah, I’m good.”

Danvers frowned and for a moment, Maggie thought that she was going to argue with her till she gave up and gave her one of their bags, but instead she just turned around and headed for the door. She unlocked it and stepped to the side, letting Maggie walk in first.

“Thanks, babe.”

Maggie didn’t miss the eye-roll as she walked past Danvers and into the house. Gesturing for Maggie to follow her, she headed down the hall. She walked behind her, looking around the house. It wasn’t exactly her style but she had to admit that the DEO had done a pretty good job decorating this place.

She followed Danvers into the room that she had entered and dropped the bags to the floor, flopping down on the bed.

“So,” she started, “which side of the bed do you want?”

Danvers blinked a couple of times, frowning. “What?”

“I’m being generous here, Danvers. So you better pick before I change my mind.”

“Oh,” Danvers breathed. “Oh, no. I’m not sleeping here.”

Maggie hoped that the relief didn’t show on her face. Not that she had anything against the woman, besides the fact that she had stolen her case and made fun of her- well, Mia’s- hairstyle, but she wasn’t really into sharing a bed with an absolute stranger. Under different circumstances, if Danvers didn’t have a girlfriend and if they weren’t pretending to be someone else, she’d be thrilled to have the woman in her bed. But right now she was honestly relieved.

“You’re not?”

“No,” she shook her head. “There’s a guest bedroom right across the hall, I’m gonna sleep there. You can stay here.”

“Okay.”

Danvers grabbed one of the bags, checking the name tag, and headed over to her room. Maggie lied down on the bed, her back popping again as it adjusted to the mattress. She closed her eyes, letting herself relax. But then she heard Danvers curse from across the hall, and prepared herself when she heard her footsteps approaching the bedroom.

“Left.”

“Huh?” Maggie opened her eyes to see Danvers standing at the foot of the bed, her arms folded across her chest.

“I want the left side of the bed,” she huffed.

Maggie propped herself up on her elbows. “What about the,” she pointed in the direction of the other room.

“You know how Elizabeth and Mia wanna start a family?”

Maggie nodded.

“That room is empty and ready to be transformed into a nursery.”

“Oh,” Maggie breathed, hoping that Danvers couldn’t say how disappointed she was, even though she could see the other woman wasn’t thrilled about it either.

“Yeah…”

Maggie shuffled over to the right side of the bed. “Well, we  _ are _ married after all,” she said, patting the spot beside her, making Danvers huff out a little laugh.

She dropped her duffle to the ground and climbed into the bed beside Maggie. “I’m so tired,” she breathed.

“Oh same.”

“Shush. You got like two hours in the car.”

“Ah, yes, the best sleep I’ve ever had.”

“Shut up, Sawyer.”

Maggie smiled, looking over at the agent. “Nap first then we unpack?”

Danvers didn’t even bother to open her eyes as she took her glasses off and put them on the nightstand next to her. “Yes, please.”

~ ~ ~

The first thought she had when she woke up was that she couldn’t feel her right arm. She tried moving it and realized that it was trapped under something. Or rather someone, she realized as she opened her eyes.

Danvers was curled into her side, her breath warm on Maggie’s neck, her sweater pulled around herself tightly, her feet tucked under Maggie’s leg.

She must’ve gotten cold.

And Maggie knew the fact that her arm was asleep wasn’t really the agent’s fault but she couldn’t help the slight wave of irritation that had bubbled up in her chest.  _ This _ was exactly why she wasn’t thrilled about sharing a bed with a stranger. It just felt like she was invading her personal space a bit too much.

She tried to pull her arm from under Danvers without waking her up, to make this awkward as little as she could, but Danvers’ eyes shot open as soon as Maggie moved. Of course Danvers would be a light sleeper.

“Maggie?”

She frowned a little. The agent had never called her anything but Sawyer. “Yeah?”

“What’s up?”

Maggie bit back an amused smile that threatened to break across her face at Danvers’ slow, sleepy voice.

“Nothing,” she shook her head. “Just can’t feel my arm.”

Danvers blinked a couple of times, as if processing what Maggie had said, before her eyes grew wide when she clearly realized how close they were and how she must’ve cuddled into Maggie while she was sleeping.

She rolled to her side of the bed as quickly as she could. “I’m  _ so  _ sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it, Danvers,” she grinned, sitting up and trying to get blood flowing in her arm again.

Danvers sat up as well, pushing her hair behind her ears. “It’s just, well, I, I get cold,” she stammered. “And for some reason I didn’t think to get under the covers before falling asleep and you were just so warm and I-“

“Danvers,” Maggie cut off her rambling. “It’s okay, really.”

Danvers nodded. “I swear it won’t happen again. I could, uh, take the couch…”

Maggie considered it for a brief second, having the bed to herself would be nice after all, but she couldn’t let the other woman get her back fucked up from sleeping on a couch.

She shook her head. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay,” Danvers bit her lip, her eyebrows knitting together, forming a little crinkle between her eyes, and Maggie wondered what was on her mind.

She glanced to the clock, noticing it was almost eight. She hadn’t intended to sleep this long and knowing what time it was, she also became hyper aware of how hungry she was, not having eaten anything all day, except for one of those gross protein bars Danvers had found in the glove compartment of the car.

She turned around back to Danvers, who still had that crinkle between her eyes, looking as if she was deep in thought.

“Uh, Danvers?” she spoke up, pulling the agent’s attention to her. “You hungry?”

Danvers nodded. “A little. J’onn said he’d make sure there would be some basic groceries. We could go grocery shopping tomorrow if you want.”

“Okay,” Maggie said as she stood up from the bed. “I’m gonna see what I can whip up from what we have.”

“I can unpack the bags while you cook?” Danvers offered.

Maggie smiled, she hated unpacking so having Danvers do it for her while she cooked, wouldn’t be so bad. “Yeah, okay.”

~ ~ ~

They sat down at the dining table about half an hour later, each of them clutching their own bowl of mac and cheese. When Danvers said ‘basic groceries’ she wasn’t kidding. There wasn’t even enough stuff to make proper pasta.

“My god this is so good,” Danvers spoke around a mouthful of pasta- Maggie was honestly impressed by the fact that she was able to speak with the amount of pasta she’d shoved into her mouth.

Maggie chuckled. “It’s just mac and cheese. Even a five year old could make this.”

Danvers squinted her eyes and took another spoonful of pasta into her mouth, chewing slowly.

“What?” Maggie asked with a frown.

“Nothing,” she shook her head as she swallowed.

Maggie put her spoon down, leaning against the table. “Danvers,” she tilted her head. “What is it?”

“Nothing, really,” she replied, and Maggie wondered how this woman was a top notch agent when she could see right through her lies.

She cocked an eyebrow, just staring at her, the way she knew made her suspects in the shrink in the chair in the interrogation room and confess everything she wanted to know.

“Fine,” Danvers huffed and mumbled something, avoiding Maggie’s eyes.

“What was that?”

“I said,” she took a deep breath, “the last time I tried making mac and cheese I burned it so bad I had to throw away the pot.”

Maggie’s jaw went slack. “No way.”

The brilliant agent, who made everyone tremble with so much as one glance, who was also supposedly a great scientist couldn’t cook.

“I just never really got around to learning how to… not burn everything I touch in the kitchen…”

“You’re telling me that you’re a freaking Doctor but can’t cook to save your life?”

Danvers shoved another spoonful into her mouth, nodding. “Yep,” she said. “Well, I’m actually a Doctor Doctor but yeah…”

Maggie blinked at her dumbly. “You’ve got to be fucking me.”

“Nope.”

“Okay Danvers,” Maggie took a deep breath, trying to understand how someone could be this _ crazy _ smart and yet unable to perform a task as simple as cooking. “I’m going to teach you how to cook.”

“Why?”

“Cause you’re my wife and apparently can’t even cook a mac and cheese without burning it.”

“How very 1950’s of you.”

“Oh come on, Danvers,” Maggie said, grinning. “Let me teach you.”

Danvers seemed to ponder the idea as she shoved another spoonful into her mouth, before nodding. “Okay,” she conceded.

Maggie’s grin widened. She was going to have so much fun watching the perfect Alex Danvers fail at something so trivial.

~ ~ ~

After they had finished their meals, Alex cleaned up their plates and grabbed a bear from the fridge for each of them. She handed one over to Maggie and settled herself on the opposite end of the couch.

They sat in fairly comfortable silence for a while, both sipping on their beers, before Maggie spoke up, “Danvers?”

“Hmm?”

“Can I ask you for a favor?”

“Sure.”

“Help me cut my hair?” she asked. “I’d go to a hairdresser but I just saw myself in the mirror when I went to the bathroom and I’m not leaving this house with  _ that _ on my head.”

Danvers chuckled, her eyes studying Maggie. “It’s not that bad…”

“Not that bad?” Maggie cocked an eyebrow. “Correct me if I’m wrong but I think it was you who said that I look li-“

“I was an ass,” Danvers cut her off, her eyes apologetic.

Maggie chuckled, taking a sip from her beer. “Oh yeah you were.”

“It’s just that…” Maggie watched as Danvers shifted on the couch, one of her legs underneath her and the other pulled to her chest. She rested her chin on her knee, fiddling with the sticker on her beer. “I didn’t wanna leave because-“

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

“Nah, I just… I didn’t want to leave because, well, because of my job.”

“Isn’t  _ this _ a part of your job?”

“Yeah,” she nodded. She ripped a piece of the sticker off, rolling it between her fingers. “But for me it’s more about protecting Supergirl, you know... And now, here, if something were to happen to her… Well, there’s nothing I could do. And I know J’onn will take good care of her but I just, I don’t think I could live with myself if something happened to her.”

Maggie didn’t say anything. Didn’t know what to say. Just watched her as she flicked the rolled piece of the beer etiquette onto the coffee table and started peeling off another bit. Her eyes were heavy and distant and Maggie wished she knew her better so she would know what to do.

“I’m sorry for the overshare,” she chuckled dryly, her eyes flicking up to Maggie’s for a brief second. “I just-“

“It’s okay, Danvers,” said Maggie, her voice gentle. “You love her…”

Danvers nodded. “Yeah, I do.”

“I can’t even imagine what it feels like to leave your girlfriend behind when her life is in danger to protect a total s-“

Danvers’ head snapped up. “Girlfriend?”

“Yeah?”

Her eyes went wide for a second before she pulled a disgusted face. “Supergirl’s not my girlfriend.”

“She’s not?”

“No.”

“Oh.”

“I, uh, no offence Maggie,” she let out a nervous laugh, “but I’m, uh, I’m not… well, uh, gay.”

Oh boy.

Danvers couldn’t get the words out and she said ‘no offence’ and she even lowered her voice when she said the word gay. But Maggie was pretty certain that she was, now, after she’d stuttered through that sentence, more than before.

Maggie had heard that same sentence from too many women who turned out to be gay.

Her gaydar was barely ever wrong.

But it wasn’t her place to say anything.

Plus, she didn’t really know Danvers that well.

Maybe it was just wishful thinking.

Maybe she was just projecting.

“Oh,” she breathed. “Sorry, I just thought-“

“No, no, no,” Danvers put her hands up, shaking her head. “You’re fine. Don’t worry.”

Maggie nodded and took a long swing of her beer. They sat there for barely a minute- a minute of awkward silence that seemed to stretch on forever- before Danvers stood up from the couch, picking up the piece of sticker from the coffee table.

“I’m gonna go,” she gestured in the direction of the bedroom, “go get some sleep. I’m really tired.”

Maggie could tell that she faked the yawn as she stretched, but she smiled at her as convincingly as she could and nodded her head. “Night, Danvers.”

“Night, Maggie,” she smiled, but Maggie could see the panic rising in her eyes, and headed to the kitchen to throw the beer bottle away. “I’ll cut your hair tomorrow, okay?” she added as she passed by on her way to the bedroom.

Maggie just smiled gratefully and finished her beer, heading to the kitchen to get another one.

Her ‘ _ vacation _ ’, as Danvers had called it back at the DEO, just got so much worse. Not only was she stuck in this small town for fuck knows how long with a federal agent who had stolen her case. She was stuck here for fuck knows how long with a federal agent who had stolen her case and was quite possibly unaware of the fact that she was gay.

And Maggie had very possibly just made her think about it.

Yeah, this ‘ _ vacation’ _ was certainly going to be fun, she thought as she cracked open another beer.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm sorry if this sucked i wrote it in the middle of the night, tired as shit... so yeah.. :D 
> 
> kudos and comments are amazing! i always love to hear what y'all think so please, leave a comment or come talk to me on tumblr, [peggycarterislife](http://peggycarterislife.tumblr.com/) or on twitter, [@pcarterislife](https://twitter.com/pcarterislife)


	4. Chapter 4

Alex felt as if she hadn’t slept at all that night, painfully aware of Maggie lying right next to her.  She jostled awake every time she so much as turned on her side, checking if she was still lying on her side of the bed, as near to the edge as possible.

She didn’t want the afternoon’s incident to repeat. She was Alex Danvers after all. She never snuggled, not unless it was with Kara when she had a bad dream or after a particularly bad mission. She hated that kind of intimacy. Even with all of her past boyfriends. And Maggie was a stranger which made a whole lot of inappropriate.

So she tried to stay as awake as she could because of that.

Because she didn’t want to end up snuggled up into Maggie’s side again. And also because her brain had decided to play Maggie’s words on a loop.

_ “I can’t even imagine what it feels like to leave your girlfriend behind when her life is in danger to protect a total s-“ _

_ Her head had snapped up at that. “Girlfriend?” _

_ “Yeah?” _

Yes, she knew that there were people who thought that Supergirl wasn’t straight- and with the way her little sister’s eyes lit up every single time she talked about her ‘ _ best friend Lena’  _ was any indication, Alex was pretty sure they were right.

The thought of someone even thinking _she_ could be _with_ _Kara_ was just all kinds of wrong, but the other thing though, the thing about her being gay… Well, she’d be lying if she said that she hadn’t been thinking about _it_ lately.

But she had just chalked it up to the fact that she was almost thirty and a serious relationship was nowhere in sight and she just wanted to meet her mother’s expectations  _ so bad _ , wanted to have the picture perfect life she knew her mom had always pictured for her, wanted her life to be as normal as it could be- alien sister and all secret agent stuff aside, of course.

So she just told herself that it was some  _ very  _ early midlife crisis- even though, considering her job, maybe not that early at all.

After all, she had no time to analyze the way her palms got all clammy and her brain seemed to take just a second too long to form a sentence whenever that barista at Noona’s smiled at her while taking her order or when Lucy came to visit, striding into the DEO in that  _ ridiculous _ uniform.

Because it meant nothing.

As a scientist she knew that same sex attraction wasn’t an uncommon thing. She knew that it was pretty normal to feel it. And she also knew that it didn’t mean that she was… gay.

So that wasn’t really what was keeping her up because she just knew she wasn’t.

The thing that was really keeping her from falling asleep was how hard it had been to get the words out of her mouth.

_ “I, uh, no offence Maggie,” her throat had suddenly felt tight so she had let out a nervous laugh, “but I’m, uh, I’m not… well, uh, gay.” _

She replayed that moment in her head like a million times, trying to figure out the reason for the way her mouth had refused to cooperate with her brain. A reason for the way the word  _ gay _ had seemed to be stuck in her throat, refusing to get out.

Maybe it was because of the way Maggie was looking at her, her eyes gentle and head tilted to the side. Maybe it was because she knew Maggie herself was gay and she didn’t want to offend her somehow.

She cringed as she replayed it in her head for the umpteenth time.

_ “I, uh, no offence Maggie.” _

Maggie’s eyes had changed then, a little. It was barely perceptible but Alex had noticed. She had noticed because she was trained to read even the smallest changes in people’s expressions. And Maggie’s had gone from soft the kind of soft people get when they’re talking to someone they don’t know and they’re trying to convey their pity as best as they can to almost that kind she used to see during the short time she’d spent at the hospital in Seattle, the kind that the doctors would get before delivering bad news to someone.

And she could see Maggie’s brain working, it was barely a couple of seconds but she could tell her brain was working a mile a minute. And then she had breathed out just a simple ‘ _ Oh. _ ’ and paused for barely a second before she started spluttering out her own apology but that second seemed like forever to Alex.

Her thoughts drifted to how she had fled the living room after that. She could feel the crinkle between her eyes forming as she tried to figure out why she had ran. She was Deputy Director Alex Danvers after all, the best agent the DEO had ever seen, a double doctor. She never ran from things- unless the  _ things  _ involved her mother, but that was different. She always stood up to everything, threw herself into everything head first.

So running in that moment really didn’t make any sense. Even though it had felt like the right thing to do, for some reason. She just knew she had to get out of that room, get as far from Maggie as she could, put some space between them.

Maybe it was because of how awkward it had been after she stuttered out the whole  _ ‘No offence, Maggie.’ _ thing. It had to be that. After the whole incident in the DEO, Alex didn’t want her to think that she was homophobic. Because she wasn’t.

Her reaction at the DEO, she reasoned, was totally normal. Anyone would’ve reacted like that if they were told they had to pretend to be married to a stranger. Yeah, it was an absolutely normal reaction.

And she had apologized for that too.

She rubbed her eyes, feeling the beginning of a headache as her brain tried to process all of her thoughts, none of which made sense to her. Glancing at the alarm clock, she noticed it was half past five. She knew there was no way she’d get any more sleep so she slipped out of the bed, grabbing some running clothes from the closet and shutting the door behind her. If she couldn’t get her mind to work the way she wanted it to, at least she still had her body.

 

~ ~ ~

Maggie woke up to an empty bed. She had kind of expected to find Danvers either cuddled up into her side again or curled up at the edge of the bed, the same way she had found her when she came into the room the previous evening.

Although it had felt a bit weird, seeing Danvers lying as far from her as possible-so far that Maggie woke up a couple of times during the night to check if she hadn’t fallen off of the bed- she totally got it. If someone had called Maggie gay before coming out, she would’ve freaked out too. Plus Danvers probably wasn’t even gay.

And even though she did feel kind of bad, seeing Danvers trying to take as little space as she could, she had to admit that not having a stranger crush your arm in your sleep did feel pretty damn great.

She stretched, yawning. Glancing to the alarm clock on her bedside table, she noticed it was only half past seven. She contemplated getting up for a moment but remembering Danvers’ words she snuggled deeper into the covers. She had told her to think of this as a vacation after all, and Maggie was one of those people who wouldn’t wake up before 9am on their day off.

So she closed her eyes, trying to drift back to sleep when she heard the beeping. Not bothering to open her eyes, she patted around her bedside table until she finally found the alarm. But it didn’t turn off when she hit it. She opened her eyes, a confused frown on her face.

It wasn’t her alarm.

Concentrating, she now realized that the beeping was a bit muffled. As if it was coming from a different room in the house. Her eyes went wide as she scrambled off of the bed, running out of the bedroom as quickly as she could, cursing herself for not realizing what it was sooner.

She nearly crashed into the kitchen doorframe as she ran into the room, coming to an abrupt stop when she took in the scene in front of her.

Danvers was standing with one leg on the kitchen island, the other on the edge of the sink and before Maggie could even ask her what she was doing she ripped the alarm off of the ceiling, leaving Maggie blinking dumbly.

She jumped back down with far too much grace for someone who had just ripped a fire alarm off of the ceiling because they apparently burned something and couldn’t get the damn thing to stop beeping, and threw it into the trash.

“Stupid alarm,” she muttered.

Maggie folded her arms across her chest, smirking. “You really weren’t kidding when you said that you can’t cook, huh?”

Danvers spun around her eyes wide. Her mouth opened once or twice without anything coming out before she let out an indignant huff, folding her arms across her chest. If Maggie didn’t know any better, she wouldn’t hold back on all the remarks about how the other woman looked like a petulant three year old.

But she could see that Danvers was clearly upset. And if she wasn’t wrong, which she was pretty sure she wasn’t, Danvers wanted to make breakfast for the both of them even though she sucked at cooking. Big time.

She looked at the pan in the sink with charred pancake batter all over it. “Do we have any more pans?” she asked instead, her voice soft, all traces of teasing gone.

Danvers just nodded wordlessly, chewing on the inside of her cheek, as she went to pull out another pan.

“Okay,” Maggie smiled, walking over to the bowl where Danvers had mixed the batter. There was still plenty of it so Danvers must’ve burned the very first one she had put on the pan. She dipped her finger in the mixture and put it into her mouth to see if it was edible or if she had to make it from the scratch, but it turned out Danvers wasn’t so hopeless after all.

Maggie hummed approvingly as she pulled her finger out of her mouth, turning to see Danvers watching her nervously.

“Breathe, Alex,” she chuckled. “It’s actually pretty good.”

Danvers’ shoulders relaxed visibly as she gave Maggie a weak smile.

“Okay, now,” she said, “I’m gonna teach you how to not burn them.”

It took two slightly burned pancakes before Danvers got a hang of it. Not that she was flipping them like a chef by the time they were done, she actually kind of reminded Maggie of her twelve year old self as she flipped them with her tongue stuck between her teeth as she tried to concentrate, but they were all nicely gold.

“Thanks,” she smiled when they sat down at the table to eat Danvers’ creation.

Maggie shrugged as she put a piece of butter on the top, watching it melt. “It’s just pancakes, Danvers.”

“No but like,” she took a deep breath, “I’m almost thirty and can’t make a damn pancake without ruining the pan.”

“Now you can,” Maggie smiled, putting a piece into her mouth. “And they’re damn good.”

Danvers grinned, ducking her head. “Yeah,  _ now _ I can. But like fifteen minutes ago I had no idea how to flip them, and if it wasn’t for you I’d be forced to go out to get us breakfast and new pans. So, thanks. For being patient with me even when I kind of burned the first two.”

“Anytime, Danvers.”

~ ~ ~

“Oh, I almost forgot,” said Danvers as she put their plates into the dishwasher. “We’re invited for dinner tomorrow.”

Maggie cocked an eyebrow. “We are?”

Danvers closed the dishwasher. “Yep,” she nodded. “I went for a run and met one of our neighbors, Adam… something, and he asked if we wanted to come over tomorrow, since we’re new and don’t know anyone around and all that bullshit.”

Maggie frowned folding her arms across her chest.

“What?” Danvers cocked an eyebrow.

“Come on, he was just trying to be friendly.”

“I’m not really a social kind of person.”

“Haven’t noticed,” Maggie deadpanned.

Danvers gave her one of those glares that Maggie knew would make any DEO rookie agent wish they were dead, but Maggie just smiled, her reaction clearly surprising the other woman.

“But it doesn’t matter cause we’re going,” she huffed. “To maintain our cover.”

“Okay,” Maggie nodded, deciding that it would be better not to rib the other woman any more.

Danvers closed the dishwasher and leaned against the counter. “So,” she asked, grabbing her coffee mug and taking a sip, “any plans for today?”

Maggie chuckled. As if there was anything for her to do in this shitty little town. But with the look Danvers had on her face Maggie knew she was asking just to lighten the mood a bit.

“No,” she shook her head. “What about you?”

Danvers took a sip before speaking, “Well I was thinking I could cut your hair?”

“Please.”

“Okay,” said Danvers as she put down her mug. “Go grab a towel from the bathroom and I’m gonna find scissors.”

After Danvers had found some scissors, Maggie found herself sitting with a towel wrapped around her shoulders, her hair ready to be cut. Her heart was beating much faster than it probably should, considering she was just getting her hair cut- again. But she liked her hair, a lot. Prided herself on how soft and shiny and perfectly wavy it was. And now she was about to let another stranger, another agent, who had probably never cut anyone’s hair, mess with hers in less than 72 hours.

“Relax,” she heard Danvers’ voice from behind her. “I’m only going to cut your hair. It won’t hurt, I promise.”

Meggie let out a nervous chuckle. “Yeah, um, Schott said almost exactly the same thing and then I when I saw what he’d done… well, it was pretty painful.”

Danvers walked around the chair, standing in front of Maggie with her arms crossed, eyes narrowed playfully. “I’m not Winn.”

Maggie just shrugged, a pained grimace on her face.

“Listen, I’m not Winn, even though, to be fair, he did give you a pretty good cut. It’s the,” she gestured to the ends of Maggie’s hair with an apologetic grin on her face, “that he fucked up.”

“Yeah.”

“And if it helps, I’ve done this before.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes,” Danvers nodded. “And you trusted me in that damn helicopter, Sawyer. Come on.”

Maggie had to admit she had a point. But this was a bit different than the helicopter thing. There it had been about Maggie’s fear of heights. Here, now, it wasn’t about her being afraid, not really, it was more about her being nervous as hell. And she knew the whole thing was stupid, but in a way it felt just like the DEO was taking even more from her, when they’d already taken the case, the  _ months _ of work, just gone like that. So she knew getting upset about her hair being fucked up was irrational but she couldn’t help it.

She sighed. “Okay.”

Danvers walked back behind her. She felt her fingers brush through her hair-  _ so softly _ \- a couple of times, and she had to remind herself to keep her eyes open and not press her head into Danvers’ hands, before she heard how Danvers grabbed the scissors from the table.

“You know I’m gonna kill you in your sleep if you fuck up, right?”

“Afraid you couldn’t take me awake?” she could hear the smirk in her tone.

“Oh I totally could,” Maggie replied. “Just wouldn’t wanna have to clean up all the mess since you’d totally put up a fight.”

“Uh-huh,” Danvers hummed, her fingers carding through Maggie’s hair again. “Whatever you need to tell yourself to boost your ego, Sawyer.”

“Shut up, Danvers.”

They both went silent for a moment after that, the only noise in the room was the cutting of the scissors, and Maggie’s heartbeat in her ears, quickening every time Danvers’ fingers brushed through her hair ever so gently, and she had to remind herself not to follow her hand whenever it left her hair.

Deciding that talking would help her concentrate better, she cleared her throat, “So, uh, you said you’ve done this before?”

“Mhm,” Danvers hummed.

“I’m trying to have a conversation here, Danvers.”

Danvers chuckled, walking around to stand in front of Maggie. She bent a little, just so she was face to face with her and pulled at the ends of her hair, studying if both sides were even, her eyes sharp with concentration. Maggie noticed how that little crinkle formed between her eyes before she moved behind her again.

“I’ve cut my sister’s hair,” she said after a moment.

“You have a sister?”

“Yeah, her name’s Kara.”

“So you’re that kinda sisters, huh?” Maggie chuckled.

“What kind?”

“The kind that braid each other’s hair, and do each other’s nails and gossip about boys…” Maggie frowned as she tried to imagine the big bad Agent Danvers gushing about a guy as her sister painted her nails some bright, obnoxious color. “Even though, I have to admit, it’s hard to picture you like that, Danvers.”

Danvers chuckled, walking in front of Maggie again. She put the scissors down and leaned against the table, her arms folded across her chest. “Yeah, I cut Kara’s hair once and on-“

Maggie’s eyes bugged out. “You what?”

“Calm down, you look great.”

If it wasn’t for the conversation they had yesterday, Maggie wouldn’t doubt that Danvers meant it in the gay way, with the way her eyes roamed across her face. But Danvers was straight, or at least she told her so, and Maggie was nothing if not respectful so she tried not to doubt what the other woman had told her, but god did her gaydar go off.

“I better,” she deadpanned, hoping Danvers didn’t notice the momentary pause. “Well, why’d you cut Kara’s hair? If it wasn’t cause of some weird kind of sister bonding...”

“Well, let’s just say that she had gum in her hair…”

“Didn’t you tell your mom?”

“No?”

“Why?”

Danvers narrowed her eyes. “Anyone ever tell you that you ask too many questions?”

Maggie shrugged, a grin spreading across her face. “I’m a detective, Danvers, I-“

“You detect, yeah, yeah, yeah…”

“So? Why did  _ you _ cut her hair?”

Danvers sighed. “Cause I kind of, sort of, might have, uh, put the gum in her hair myself.”

Maggie blinked dumbly a couple of times before she burst out laughing. “No, you didn’t.”

“Yes, I did,” Danvers nodded, laughing as well.

“Why would you do that to a sibling?”

Maggie’s brother was a toddler when she was kicked out so she never really got to have a real relationship with him, he probably didn’t even know that he had a sister. But her aunt’s kids were like siblings to her, even though they were a lot younger than her, and she couldn’t imagine sticking gum into their hair.

“I don’t know,” she shrugged, but Maggie noticed the way her eyes lost that glint they had while she was laughing. “We were kids. Kids do dumb stuff.”

“Yeah,” Maggie nodded, not wanting to pry any more.

“You’re all done by the way.”

“Thanks.”

Danvers smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “I’m gonna, uh,” she gestured to the door that lead to the living room, “I’m just gonna watch some TV. Feel free to join me.”

“Okay, thanks.”

Maggie sat there for a moment after Danvers had left, wondering what she had said that upset the other woman so much. But she couldn’t figure it out. Maybe Danvers was just a really private person and Maggie over-stepped a line when she asked her about her family so much…

She took the towel off of her shoulders carefully, and wrapped it up so she would get the hair everywhere. Careful not to step into all the hair that was on the floor, she headed to the bathroom to throw the towel into the sink, deciding that the mess that was left on the floor was the priority now.

But before she left the bathroom, she stopped in front of the mirror, looking up slowly. She brushed her fingers through her hair tentatively. Smiling when the ends didn’t feel all dry like they did when they were blonde. It was a bit shorter than it had been in a long time, barely brushing past her shoulders. But it wasn’t bad.

Danvers didn’t lie when she said she looked good. Maybe she should learn to let herself trust her at least a little bit more, after all, her life pretty much depended on her. And maybe with, with some time, Maggie could get Danvers to trust her a bit too, maybe even enough to tell her why she had stuck gum in her sister’s hair.

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kudos and comments are amazing! i always love to hear what y'all think so please, leave a comment or come talk to me on tumblr, [peggycarterislife](http://peggycarterislife.tumblr.com/) or on twitter, [@pcarterislife](https://twitter.com/pcarterislife)
> 
> also i'm going to the EOE show in Vienna!! so hmu if you're going too!! :D


	5. Chapter 5

Danvers’ fingers were laced with hers as they walked up the couple of steps to Adam “ _ Something’s _ ” door, and her hand felt a little clammy in Maggie’s. She could see, from the corner of her eye, how Danvers kept glancing at their joined hands, her grip uncertain. And Maggie was doing her best not to think about it but with the way Danvers had insisted she wasn’t homophobic, and with how she had said ‘ _ No offence, Maggie.’  _ before telling her that she wasn’t gay... Well, it was taking her  _ a lot _ to just focus on being the perfect Mia instead of asking Danvers what her problem was.

“You ready?” she asked once they stopped in front of the door.

She was expecting to get another glare or maybe an eye roll from Danvers, because of course, she was  _ always _ ready, but when she looked over at the other woman, she was met with a wide-eyed look on her face.

“Huh?”

“I asked if you’re ready.”

“Oh, uh,” she cleared her throat. “Yeah, um, you?”

Maggie just nodded, frowning slightly when that little crinkle appeared between Danvers’ eyes for a spilt second. “Okay then,” Danvers breathed before knocking.

Danvers seemed nowhere near okay, if the crinkle and the way she was biting the inside of her cheek were any indication, but Maggie had no time to ask her about it because she could already hear quick footsteps, as if someone was running, from the other side of the door. Then there was a crash, as if whoever was running to the door slipped, and crashed straight into it. She frowned and looked over at Danvers, seeing that she had a similar, confused expression on her face.

“I won!” came an excited squeal from the other side of the door.

And  _ oh _ .

Of course they had a kid.

“You okay?” they heard another child’s voice, slightly muffled by the door, clearly concerned for their sibling who had crashed into the door.

Great so they had two kids.

“Yeah,” the first one replied.

They waited for a little while longer, listening to how one of the kids tried convincing the other to open the door, the second kid refusing, repeating them what their parents had told them about opening the door without them.

It was barely a minute. And in that minute Maggie’s brain tried to process the fact that not only would she have to pretend to be happily married and ready to start a family with her beloved wife, who she barely knew, she would also have to interact with children and make it seem like she totally wanted some herself, and that she was actually good with them.

And she knew she’d have to interact with some children sooner or later, she just didn’t think it would be this soon. She was also hoping that she’d at least get some time to mentally prepare herself.

For a moment she squeezed Danvers’ hand tighter, cursing herself the moment she’d realized what she had done. She loosened her grip again, hoping that Danvers didn’t notice, even though it was pretty obvious from the look on her face that she totally did. But, thankfully, she didn’t have enough time to say anything before the door swung open.

~ ~ ~

They were all sitting in the living room because the dinner wasn’t ready yet- which Adam had apologized profusely for. So he had poured them each a glass of wine and settled on the couch next to his wife, Eleanor, for some small talk.

They seemed to be pretty great people. The kind of people Maggie wouldn’t mind hanging out with even if it wasn’t for maintaining their cover. Adam worked at the local police station and Eleanor was a pediatrician at St Luke’s. They were both sweet and the kind of funny that Maggie enjoyed and she really found herself enjoying their presence.

Well, for one or, rather two, tiny details.

Turned out the kids were actually twins which, in all honesty, was Maggie’s worst nightmare. Maggie was pretty sure she wouldn’t be able to tell them apart if they weren’t dressed in different colored shirts.

But that wasn’t the worst thing.

The worst thing was that one of the twins was called Maggie. Her brain had to work extra hard so she wouldn’t react every time someone called the little Maggie.

At first they were shy, only eyeing both of them from a distance. But then they got a bit closer, staying close to their parents. And Maggie honestly wished she could just blend in with the couch so the kids wouldn’t notice her.

And Danvers seemed to notice that, because  _ of course _ she did, so she just pulled the twins’ attention to herself, kneeling so she would be at their eye level as she introduced herself to them as if they were regular grown-ups. And she made it seem so effortless, so natural. She shook each of their tiny hands and then even introduced herself to Angie’s stuffed penguin- Waddles- with a completely normal face, making sure to shake his fin. As if it was an absolutely normal thing that people do every day.

And the kids seemed to be overflowing with joy as Danvers listened to them intently while they babbled away about how Waddles is a penguin but can’t really swim, and how they’d tried giving him a bath but then mommy had to put him in the drier after that so they had spent “ _ hoooours” _ sitting in front of it so he wouldn’t be scared.

Maggie’s automatic response to that would’ve been something along the lines of ‘ _ You gave the plushie a bath, what were you expecting?’  _ But Danvers just smiled at them with so much kindness in her eyes that Maggie was honestly thrown for a moment and told them that they were amazing for thinking of that, that she was sure Waddles had appreciated it.

She watched her interact with the kids- watched as they ran off to the kitchen to ‘ _ help’ _ Adam finish the dinner, Danvers just smiling and telling them she couldn’t wait to see what they prepare- trying to hide how badly she was freaking out on the inside, while her brain tried to connect  _ this _ Danvers, the soft and mushy and all kid friendly Danvers, with the one she had seen at the DEO, the hard and commanding agent who could any agent tremble with just one look.

Granted, Danvers was a top notch agent, second in command in that ridiculous James Bond kind of organization, so she surely had great training. It shouldn’t be surprising. She was sure Danvers had been undercover countless times as well, so maybe that was why she didn’t seem nervous at all.

Maggie had been undercover before, and she had always done great, busted the bad guys every time. She hadn’t been so nervous about pretending to be someone else since her first undercover op. Maybe it was because this, now, was much bigger than going undercover to prove that the local coffee shop owner was involved in money laundering.  

If she screwed this up, she could die. Hell, Danvers could die. And as big of a pain in the as she had been at the beginning, she turned out to be pretty okay. Plus, Maggie wouldn’t forgive herself if she was responsible for someone’s death.

She just hoped no one could tell how nervous she was.

Danvers returned to her seat next to Maggie and put a hand on her knee, rubbing small circles with her thumb-  _ of course _ she had noticed how nervous she was.

She looked at Danvers as she chatted with Eleanor about some science-y stuff Maggie couldn’t be bothered to keep up with. She seemed perfectly calm. If Maggie didn’t know that the whole thing was just pretend, she wouldn’t suspect anything.

“Dinner’s ready!” Adam called from the dining room, suddenly.

They headed to the other room and Maggie tried to ignore the fact that she kind of missed the calming warmth of Danvers’ hand on her knee.

“Adam’s an  _ amazing _ cook,” said Eleanor, smiling as she sat down.

“What she means is that I manage not to burn every single dish I make,” Adam grinned when he came back to the room, somehow managing to balance two plates in each hand.

Eleanor just rolled her eyes and waved him off, insisting that he was just being modest.

Maggie grinned, looking over at Danvers. “What’s it with you science people and not knowing how to cook?”

Danvers just shot her a glare, shoving her shoulder lightly.

“You too?”

Danvers took a breath to answer, ready to defend herself but Maggie didn’t let her. “She tried making me breakfast the other day. Let’s just say that the fire alarm woke me up…”

“I was trying to do something nice for you!”

“I know, babe,” Maggie conceded, trying to give Danvers her best fake loving smile.

She didn’t miss the way Danvers’ eyes seemed to flash with something when the term of endearment slipped from her mouth, breaking her out of the character for a split second. She had no time to think about what it was though, so she just turned her attention back to the others.

“Daddy says we can’t cook alone yet ‘cause we don’t know how,” one of the twins- Maggie had honestly forgotten which was which- piped up as she climbed onto her chair.

The other twin nodded her head vigorously. “And we would set something on fire or hurt ourselves.”

“Well your daddy is a very smart man,” said Danvers, smiling at the twins kindly.

The first twin- Maggie. Yeah, Maggie was pretty sure this one was Maggie. Or was it Angie?- frowned. “Didn’t your daddy tell you not to cook alone if you don’t know how?”

She looked over at Danvers, a smug grin on her face as she waited to see how the agent would deal with the kid’s question. But instead of a giving them some kind of child-friendly retort as Maggie was expecting, she saw Danvers freeze momentarily, before shrugging it off, saying that he had probably forgotten.

She wanted to ask her if she was okay, but she couldn’t. Not then and there at least. So she dug into her food and made a mental note to maybe ask her about it later.

~ ~ ~

The dinner was going pretty well. The twins turned out to be a blessing in disguise, pulling most of the conversations to themselves- which Maggie was so incredibly grateful for, since that meant less opportunities to blow their cover.

She had even started to relax a bit. Her cheeks didn’t hurt from pretending to smile so much anymore, the smile having turned genuine.

That was until Adam had asked Maggie to pass the salt.

Of course he was asking Little Maggie.

Because the salt and pepper shakers were  _ right _ in front of her.

If Maggie, Big Maggie, wanted to reach the salt and pass it to Adam, she’d have to stand up and reach for it.

Which she did. Unconsciously.

It was barely a couple of seconds, really, but it felt as if she was standing there for  _ hours _ . Just frozen in place. Her heart hammering like crazy, mouth dry and brain trying to come up with something,  _ anything _ to get her out of this mess.

It felt like a forever till she got her mouth working again. “Excuse me,” she blurted out, her voice just a tad too high to sound casual. “I gotta use the bathroom.”

“Right down the hall,” said Adam, pointing in the general direction of the bathroom.

Maggie didn’t dare look at Danvers as she left the table, her heart pounding in her ears. She was going to give Maggie  _ so much shit _ for this. But at least the family didn’t seem to notice anything suspicious.

At least she hoped they didn’t.

She found the bathroom, closing and locking the door behind her. She walked straight to the sink and splashed some cold water on her face, hoping it would help her calm down a little.

It had only been a couple of days and she had already fucked up.

Pretty big.

And if it was only about her own life, she probably wouldn’t even care that much. She didn’t feel like dying just yet but her losing her life wouldn’t be uncommon, in her line of work. She had learned that a long time ago, learned to accept it and not to make a big deal out of it.

But this was also about Danvers, about someone else’s life. The director had sent Danvers here with her for Maggie’s safety, as well as her own. They hadn’t spent much time together but Danvers was slowly growing on her, even with the whole moody, kind of homophobic thing she had going on and the burnt pancakes. Danvers seemed to be a good person. And Maggie wouldn’t be the cause of her death. She wouldn’t forgive herself.

She had to be more careful from now on.

Because even though this family seemed absolutely normal, CADMUS had people everywhere. She had learned that in the past couple of months.

A soft knock on the door pulled her out of her thoughts. “Babe?” Danvers’ voice was muffled by the door, but the concern Maggie could hear in it was quite believable- she had to admit, the woman was pretty damn impressive. “You okay?”

She took in a deep breath, preparing herself for Danvers in her Big Bad Agent Danvers mode, and opened the door. Danvers walked in, closing the door behind her with a soft click. When she turned around to face Maggie, her features were hard but her eyes were soft. Maggie could see a glint of genuine concern in them.

“What the fuck?” Danvers hissed, her voice not as harsh as Maggie was expecting.

“I’m so sorry,” said Maggie, keeping her voice low. “I was trying so hard but then I just- It’s reflex!”

Danvers sighed, rubbing her eyes. “I know,” Danvers sighed. “I know it’s  _ a lot _ , but this can’t happen again. Okay?”

“Yeah,” she nodded. “Of course.”

“Okay. Let’s get back out there.”

Maggie was not expecting her to go  _ this _ easy on her.

Danvers turned around and opened the door, letting Maggie walk out of the bathroom first.

“Wait,” Danvers whisper-yelled, making her stop after a couple of steps.

She turned around, facing Danvers. “Yeah?”

“Well,” Danvers lowered her voice even more, stepping a bit closer to Maggie. “I told them that you got upset cause your our dog, Margaret, passed away recently.”

“You what?”

“I, well, uh, panicked too?” Danvers shrugged. “Had to give them some kinda explanation.”

Maggie cocked an eyebrow. “And our dead dog Margaret is the best you could do?”

She regretted it the moment it left her mouth. Because  _ this _ was her fault and Danvers was just trying to clean up her mess and as unconvincing as the dead dog thing sounded to Maggie, in the end it really didn’t matter.

Danvers set her jaw tight and jabbed her finger into Maggie’s chest, telling her how she wasn’t really in a position to judge her, and how she wouldn’t have had to come up with anything if she hadn’t fucked up in the first place and Maggie was honestly impressed by how intimidating Danvers looked even though she was whispering the whole time.

She wanted to stop her, and apologize, to tell her she didn’t mean it like that. But she had clearly set her off. And even though Maggie didn’t say anything  _ that _ bad, it didn’t look like Danvers was going to stop any time soon.

She tried to cut her off but Danvers had only jabbed her finger into Maggie’s chest harder. But then Maggie heard it. Footsteps. Someone was coming down the hall and if Danvers didn’t shut up, they would be totally fucked pretty soon.

So she tried to get her to stop, but Danvers’ features only hardened as she took a step closer into Maggie’s space. And whoever was coming down the hall would turn the corner in a couple of seconds.

She didn’t really think as she took Danvers’ face into her hands and pulled her down, standing up on her tiptoes slightly, as she brought their lips together.

Danvers froze. The finger that she had poked Maggie in the chest with, seemed to be stuck in Maggie’s sternum. Her lips weren’t moving against Maggie’s as she kissed her. And Maggie was pretty sure she had stopped breathing as well.

But even despite all of that, she tried to make the kiss seem as real as she could. Moving her thumbs across Danvers’ cheeks, keeping her lips soft on hers.

And she was  _ sure  _ that just before she had pulled back, Danvers kissed her back. Her lips tentative and so soft that if they hadn’t been still slightly pursed when she pulled back- when she heard the person come to a stop next to them- she would’ve thought she’d just imagined it.

“I just wanted to check up on you guys,” Eleanor’s voice pulled her to look away from Danvers’ eyes- that for some reason seemed wide and panicked. “See if you’re okay.”

“Yeah,” she nodded. “All good.”

Danvers’ eyes were screaming the exact opposite though.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey everyone!! i'm back!! i'm sorry this took so long but i had a terrible writers block plus i was super busy with life and stuff... i also have this huge exam (maturita i guess you could say it's something like SATs??) tomorrow so i've been studying like crazy... and i'm SUPER stressed cause i need to fucking ace it... so wish me luck:D 
> 
> i know this chapter wasn't the best but please lemme know what you think in the comments or come talk to me on tumblr, [peggycarterislife](http://peggycarterislife.tumblr.com/) or on twitter, [@pcarterislife](https://twitter.com/pcarterislife)
> 
> also... is anyone going to the EOE show in Vienna? hmu if you wanna meet up!!


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wrote this at 4am and i wasn't going to post it but i was told that i should so here... (sorry if it sucks!!)

Alex knew she shouldn’t have snapped at Maggie like that.  She honestly had no reason. But she hadn’t really gotten any sleep since they got here. Well, except for that nap when she woke up curled up around Maggie. She just couldn’t sleep at night, too aware of the fact that someone else was lying next to her. And sleeping on the couch wasn’t really an alternative either since it was too short for her.

So she was tired and cranky.

And a part of her wanted to believe that the lack of sleep was to blame. But another part of her, the one that kept reminding her that she was literally trained to go  _ days _ without sleep, knew better.

Because it had been okay, albeit a bit awkward, after that first nap. But then, that evening, when they were sitting on the couch, drinking beer and just enjoying the shared silence, Maggie had somehow brought  _ the thing _ up. And Alex’s asshole brain had apparently decided that playing the conversation on a loop and nitpicking every single detail would be the smart thing to do.

And it was actually bearable while it was just that one conversation.

But then, this morning happened and it all got just so much worse.

Maggie had been sitting at the kitchen counter, her hair up in a messy bun and she had a sweatshirt on, and the sleeves were just a bit too long so they went past her knuckles. Alex had tried not to look at her too obviously as she waited for the coffee to brew, had tried to ignore the weird sensation in her stomach whenever she glanced in Maggie’s direction. And when she had handed Maggie her cup, the other woman had given her one of those annoyingly bright dimpled smiles- and  _ fuck _ the morning sun hitting her face had only made it seem brighter.

But that still had been pretty okay. Alex had felt the fluttering in her stomach around women before and she had never really thought about it that much, always chalking it up to jealousy.

What had made her eyes go wide and spill her own hot coffee over her hand, though, had been the way Maggie had chuckled and said, ‘ _ Thanks, babe.’ _ , with a wink.

In that moment, Alex had felt as if a ton of bricks came crashing down at her. Her brain had suddenly slapped her across the face with memories of her and her high school best friend, Vicky. Of how her stomach had swooped every time Vicky had called her ‘babe’, and how Alex just couldn’t tear her eyes off of her sometimes. Of how her heart had always seemed to shoot up into her throat whenever Vicky so much as smiled at her.

But that still didn’t have to mean that she was… Right?

She had never thought about girls that way, never really considered that they could be an option for her. Hell, she’d never even kissed a girl.

Well, now she had.

Maggie’s lips had been so soft on hers, and her hands had been  _ so _ gentle as she had pulled her down. Alex could feel her whole body going numb, her brain trying to catch up with what was happening, trying to figure out how someone’s lips could be just so  _ damn _ soft.

But before her brain had caught up with what was happening, before she could try moving her own lips against Maggie’s, the other woman was already pulling back.

And now, as she opened her eyes, everything seemed to be in slow motion, somehow. She could hear Eleanor’s voice but she couldn’t bring herself to look away from Maggie’s face. She kind of felt like she couldn’t breathe, even though, she could feel her chest rising and falling with each breath. She heard her own voice, it sounded distant to her ears, as she told Eleanor that they were okay, that everything was good, even though her heart was racing, her brain going a mile a minute as she tried to come up with a reasonable explanation for everything,  _ anything _ that could just make her stop thinking about  _ the thing _ .

She was straight, there was no reason for her to panic like this.

Maggie took her hand as they made their way back into the dining room and she tried so hard to ignore the fluttering sensation in her stomach.

She was  _ straight _ .

She seriously needed to get some sleep.

~ ~ ~

Maggie frowned when she walked into the bedroom that night, finding Danvers lying on her half of the bed, reading a book, a wall of pillows between hers and Maggie’s side of the bed.

“What’s that?”

“Pillows,” Danvers replied without looking up from the book.

Maggie’s frown deepened at that, she padded over the rest of the way to the bed and slipped under the cover. She leaned against the headboard, arms crossed over her chest as she kept looking at Danvers, who was so clearly only pretending to be reading, her eyes still glued to the same page.

“Stop staring at me.”

Maggie cocked an eyebrow at Danvers’ tone, the big bad Agent Danvers tone, the one she hadn’t used since they left the DEO.

“What’s up with the pillows?”

Danvers turned a page- Maggie was  _ sure _ her eyes had been glued to the same spot on the left page for the past couple of minutes.

“What do you mean what’s up with the pillows?”

Danvers finally looked up from her book, meeting Maggie’s eyes.

“Jesus, Danvers, quit playing dumb.”

Maggie was almost sure it was because of the kiss.

They had discussed it, both knowing that they needed a bit of PDA to maintain their cover. So the way Danvers freaked out on her after the kiss didn’t really make sense. Not with all the experience Danvers claimed to have when it came it undercover ops.

But Danvers had spent the rest of the evening in her head, barely joining in on the conversations, not even paying that much attention to the twins anymore.

And, in all honesty, Maggie felt a little bad for causing her to freak out like that. If she had known Danvers would’ve reacted like that she probably wouldn’t have kissed her. But that would’ve probably led to Danvers blowing their covers…

“I’m not-“

“Is this because I kissed you?”

Danvers’ eyes went wide.

Maggie wasn’t the kind of person that labeled other people, she tried to remind herself that Danvers had told her that she was straight. But god was it hard when she was looking at her with those wide, panicked eyes. The same look that Maggie had seen countless of times.

And she was so  _ sure _ , her gaydar was rarely ever wrong. Danvers was either so deep in the closet she didn’t even know she was in one, or she was just pretty homophobic.

Either way Maggie knew the next couple of weeks? Months? God knows how long they were going to be stuck here together… Were going to be hard.

Danvers’ mouth opened and closed a couple of times before she finally managed to get some words out. “I, uh, what?”

Maggie just tilted her head, waiting for the other woman to get something more coherent out.

“I, Maggie, no! Of course not!”

Maggie cocked an eyebrow. “You sure?”

“Yeah, I’m, uh, not homophobic!”

Danvers looked so scared and sincere, Maggie’s heart ached a little for her. Because if she really was telling the truth, which Maggie thought she was, the fear in her eyes wasn’t caused by Maggie implying that she might be a bit homophobic, it was because of the scary truth she was so obviously trying to push down and ignore.

“Okay so, uh, is this maybe because you liked the kiss?” Maggie gave herself a mental slap the moment the words left her mouth.

Danvers’ eyes seemed to grow even wider. “What?” her voice was so high pitched even Danvers herself cringed a little. “Maggie, I’m not, uh, I told you I’m not…”

God she couldn’t even say the word.

“Gay?” Maggie helped her, noticing how Danvers’ throat bobbed as she swallowed roughly.

“Yeah,” she nodded. “That.”

Maggie had no idea what she had done in her life to deserve  _ this.  _ Being stuck in a strange town, with a strange person for the foreseeable future was bad enough. Adding a panicked baby gay to the mix just made everything so much worse.

“You’d be surprised how many gay women I’ve heard that from.”

She was such an asshole. This was probably exactly why she was stuck here with Danvers.

Danvers took a deep shuddering breath and put her book on the nightstand. “I’m just gonna, uh, take a shower.”

Maggie just nodded, not saying anything about how she had showered when they got home, and watched as Danvers basically ran out of the room, leaving Maggie alone with her racing mind.

She had no idea what to do. And she knew she could’ve handled it better. But the prospect of spending  _ months _ with someone so deep in denial about a pretty big part of herself just seemed like an absolute nightmare.

So she just went and basically dragged her out of the closet.

God she was such an ass.

Danvers had nowhere to run, she had to stay here with Maggie. She had no one to talk to either- except for Maggie, of course, but she doubted Danvers would want to talk about it any time soon, if ever. And it wasn’t like she could just go to their new friends and tell them about how she was probably gay since she already had a wife.

She really should’ve thought it through before opening her mouth.

As painful as months spent in the company of a very oblivious Danvers would be, it probably would’ve been better than the panicky baby gay she had unleashed now.

Maggie pretended to be asleep when Danvers got back.

Danvers settled herself on the very edge of the bed like she did every night, even despite the pillow wall between them.

As hard as Maggie tried she couldn’t fall asleep, trying to think of a way to help the other woman.

Judging by Danvers’ breathing, she didn’t get much sleep either.

 

~ ~ ~

The next couple of weeks were… tense.

They both started working, and as much as Maggie hated her job- there was a reason librarians were mostly old ladies and she would kill whoever was responsible for choosing the job for her when they got back- she was grateful for it.

It gave them both something to do, even though Maggie wanted to die every second she spent in that fucking library, her whole body itching to just get out of there and do  _ something _ . Anything that didn’t require paperwork or sitting on her butt all day.

She could’ve been out there, chasing Cadmus and Lord, but instead she spent her days doing basically nothing. The poor idiot that had picked this job for her would seriously regret being born once they were back. (A part of her hoped it was Winn, wanting to get revenge for her hair as well.)

And as much as Danvers complained about some of her students, Maggie could see how much she enjoyed working again, how  _ relaxed _ she was every day after work.

Things between them weren’t as awkward as Maggie expected they would be. Granted, there was this huge elephant in the room but they had a silent agreement that they wouldn’t bring it up. Or at least that Maggie wouldn’t bring it up. Even though she had caught Danvers staring at her in a way that was far from straight more than once. But Danvers didn’t seem like she wanted to talk about it, so they didn’t.

They cooked together almost every evening. And as disastrous as Danvers was the moment she walked into the kitchen, Maggie had to admit she was getting better. She would still seem like one of the worst cooks to anyone that hadn’t seen her ‘cooking’ a couple of weeks back, but Maggie was really damn proud of the tiny progress Danvers had made.

They would watch some TV every night, curled up on that shitty little couch that Danvers wouldn’t stop bitching about. And some nights, when they drank a bit more than one beer, Danvers would get more visibly more comfortable. On the rare occasion, she would even rest her head on Maggie’s shoulder and Maggie would try to ignore how aware of her own body she was, how she tried not to move so Alex would just keep her head there. But that never lasted long- and Maggie would deny the disappointment that bubbled up in her chest every time- because no matter how many beers Danvers had in her, she would eventually realize how close she was and pull away with a panicked look on her face. Most of the times she would excuse herself, telling Maggie how she was suddenly too tired and needed to go to bed.

Maggie knew better though.

But didn’t say anything, knowing it wouldn’t be fair since Danvers had to stay in this house with her.

So it wasn’t the best but it didn’t suck as much as she had expected it would. They had their own little routine, and as tense as things were at times, Maggie had learned to live with it, had learned to live with Danvers.

She had even come to like her a little.

In the friendly way, of course.

The butterflies in her stomach anytime Danvers leaned against her shoulder while watching TV were purely friendly. Nothing gay about them.

~ ~ ~

She had gotten used to waking up to the sound of the fire alarm or the smell of coffee on the weekends. Danvers always wanted to do something nice for her, even if that meant they had to open all the windows and freeze their butts off to get all the smoke out.

So when she woke up one Saturday and she didn’t smell coffee or hear the alarm she just assumed Danvers had decided to sleep in. Finally admitting that it was too cold for her Californian ass to be running in the cold East Coast winter.

She peaked over the wall of pillows that was still stacked between their halves of the bed and frowned when she found her fake wife’s half empty. She grabbed a sweatshirt that she had left beside the bed last night and pulled it over her head as she left the bedroom.

The house was quiet. Usually they would both be eating breakfast by now, laughing at whatever dish Danvers managed to burn. But it was quiet now. She couldn’t hear anything beside her own heartbeat.

She made her way down the hall as quietly as she could, carefully peeking into the living room, her heart nearly stopping when she noticed the person sitting on the couch, before her brain could process that it was Danvers.

“Jesus Christ,” she said, clutching a hand to her chest as she walked over to the couch, laughing a little. “You scared the shit out of me, Danvers.”

Danvers would normally tell her something about how detectives like her were the reason why the feds got most of the ‘real’ cases. So when she didn’t, Maggie knew something was wrong. Her stomach dropped the moment she saw Alex’s face, pale and worried.

“What’s wrong?” she asked carefully, sitting down next to her.

Danvers just nodded towards the coffee table, her jaw clenched so tight Maggie worried she might break her teeth.

She looked over at the table and felt as if someone had dumped a cold bucket of water over her.

There was a torn up envelope, a burner phone and a simple note.

 

> _   
>  _ _   
>  _ _ 0800 _

  
  


Maggie’s throat felt very dry suddenly. “Fuck.”

“Pretty much,” Danvers nodded.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know it's been like forever and i'm so sorry but i've been so fucking busy... should have more time now though so i hope i'll get back to updating every week or at least two.. :D
> 
>  
> 
> please lemme know what you think (your comments are honestly what makes me write) in the comments or come talk to me on tumblr, [peggycarterislife](http://peggycarterislife.tumblr.com/) or on twitter, [@pcarterislife](https://twitter.com/pcarterislife)


	7. Chapter 7

“What, uh, what are we gonna do?”

Alex glanced over at Maggie, her eyes glued to the note. She ran a hand through her hair, sighing. “I don’t know.”

Maggie nodded, her brow furrowing in concentration. “What do you think it means?”

She almost snapped at Maggie in that moment, because would she be sitting on this shitty couch, going over all the things they might’ve fucked up over the past couple of weeks that would give them away, or all the possible meanings and outcomes of the note, if she knew? But she could see how nervous, scared even, Maggie was. So she just took a deep breath and shook her head.

“I don’t know.”

She’d always hated the feeling of not knowing the answer to anything. Watching Maggie’s anxious eyes made it only worse.

“Maybe it’s time?” Maggie suggested.

“Yeah, that was my first thought,” Alex nodded.

“Okay so,” Maggie cleared her throat, wiping her palms on her pajama bottoms as she straightened her back, “maybe that’s when they’re going to call?”

Alex could see how she switched into her detective mode almost seamlessly, features hard and concentrated, that ‘not taking anyone’s bullshit’ face on. It almost felt like if she listened carefully enough she would hear the thoughts racing through her brain.

She tried to ignore the butterflies in her stomach as she watched Maggie, looking at the note as if it could tell her more. She tried to ignore the warm feeling as she watched the way Maggie’s brow furrowed slightly, the way she pulled her bottom lip between her teeth. She tried not to focus on the way Maggie’s long fingers picked up the note and flipped it over and-

Okay no.

She seriously had to focus now.

There was no time for… whatever that weird thing when she noticed even the smallest of things about Maggie was called.

She’d gotten good at ignoring all of it over the past couple of weeks after all.

She really did.

(Or at least she hoped she would if she kept telling herself so.)

“Danvers?”

Maggie’s voice pulled her out of her thoughts.

“Uh,” she cleared her throat, “yes?”

“What time is it?”

Alex pulled her phone out of the pocket of her jacket. “8am in 7 minutes.”

“Okay then,” Maggie said, standing up from the couch, “we wait and see.”

“Wait and see?” Alex echoed.

“Yeah,” she nodded, heading to the kitchen. “Coffee?”

“Coffee?”

“Yeah, okay, you really need one.”

“No, but,” she stood up, following Maggie to the kitchen, “how can you focus on coffee right now? What if, what if it’s bad? What if it’s CADMUS? What if they found us? We should get-“

Alex cut herself off as Maggie stepped into her personal space, putting- what she guessed was supposed to be- a calming hand on her shoulder.

“Alex,” Maggie breathed, her voice soft and low and Alex hoped Maggie didn’t notice the way her breath hitched. Alex was positive she could count the times Maggie had called her by her first name on her hands with fingers to spare. But anytime she did… it left Alex trying not to think about the way it left her feeling. “Breathe. If it’s really CADMUS then there’s pretty much no point in trying to run away. They would never send us a note without being sure we had nowhere to run.”

Alex nodded slowly.

Maggie was right.

“Now go sit down, watch the phone in case it rings. I’ll bring you your coffee.”

Alex nodded dumbly, swallowing the disappointment when Maggie’s hand left her shoulder. She walked back to the living room and sat down on the couch, crossing her arms over her chest, eyes trained on the phone as if it could run away.

She tried to focus on the phone and the possible threat instead of how cute Maggie looked in those flannel pajama bottoms and yet another oversized sweater and her hair all messy-

No.

She was totally not thinking... those... thoughts again.

But she was.

And she had been thinking about Maggie _like_ _that_ over the past couple of weeks. But that didn’t have to mean anything… Right?

She usually didn’t even let those thoughts go far.

But there had been a couple occasions where she didn’t stop herself. She let herself wonder what it would feel like to sleep curled up into Maggie’s side again, without those  _ damn pillows _ between them- she was honestly starting to regret putting them there in the first place.

She let herself wonder what it would feel like to hold Maggie’s hand for real, without pretending to be anything.

She let herself wonder what it would feel like to kiss Maggie again- they hadn’t kissed after that first time, Alex knew Maggie wouldn’t kiss her again if she didn’t initiate it and Alex was just too damn scared after the last time. She couldn’t stop wondering about what it would feel like to really kiss her, not just stand there, frozen, while Maggie kissed her with those impossibly soft lips.

She wondered what it would feel like to card her fingers through Maggie’s hair and to really hold her while they watched all those shitty movies instead of just leaning against her awkwardly, trying not to move a muscle so Maggie wouldn’t pull away.

She wondered what it would feel like to loop her arms around her waist and watch over her shoulder as she taught her how to cook and what it would feel like to spin her around and press her against that damn counter and-

“Here,” Maggie’s soft voice pulled her out of her thoughts.

She took the offered mug from Maggie’s hands, smiling gratefully as she took a slow tentative sip. But of course it was too hot to drink yet and she burned her tongue.

At least it cleared her head of the rest of those thoughts, the thoughts that definitely didn’t have to mean that she wasn’t straight.

(Even though she wasn’t so sure about that these past couple of days.)

“Careful it’s hot,” Maggie said when she saw Alex wince.

Alex put on the most sarcastic smile she could manage with Maggie looking at her with those deep brown eyes, looking like she actually cared. “No shit.”

Maggie was about to say something when the burner phone rang. They both exchanged a wide-eyed look before glancing at the clock.

“Huh, so I guess it really was time.”

Alex nodded. “And they’re on the dot.”

She reached for the phone and pressed answer before she could really think about it. She didn’t say anything though, waiting for the person on the other line to speak up first.

A couple of seconds passed by before, “Danvers?”

Alex’s heart stopped and accelerated almost at the same time.

She rubbed her eyes, letting out a relieved sigh. “I swear to everything that’s holy, I’m going to  _ kill you _ .”

She could see the way Maggie’s eyes went wide before she cocked an eyebrow.

“Don’t tell me I scared the big bad Agent Danvers.”

“You’re  _ so _ dead, Lane.”

“I’m so putting that on my resume.”

“You’re  _ such _ an asshole!”

“An asshole with style.”

Alex shook her head. “I hate you.”

“You love me.”

“Fuck off.”

Maggie cleared her throat, making Alex turn and look at her, and if Alex wasn’t so annoyed with her best friend right now she would maybe take a second to appreciate how cute Maggie looked with that confused frown and-

Focus, Danvers.

“We’re okay,” she told her.

Maggie exhaled a breath of relief, sinking back into the couch.

“What do you want, Luce?”

“I have some intel for you guys.”

Alex glanced to Maggie who was now sitting up straight again, clearly having heard what Lucy said.

“What intel?”

“You’re really expecting me to tell you over the phone, Alexandra?”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Then start using your brain, Alexandra.”

“It’s a god damn burner phone!”

“One can never be too careful.”

Alex rolled her eyes even though Lucy couldn’t see her.

“You wanna meet?”

“22:00 in the parking lot of that tiny bakery next to the train tracks.”

“We’ll be there.”

~ ~ ~

“You cold?”

Danvers pushed her hands deeper into the pockets of her coat, glaring at Maggie. “Oh shut up.”

Maggie just shook her head, an amused grin on her face. She really had no idea how this woman could be DEO’s finest when she was barely coping in 37 degrees.

“I’m from California!”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“No, but I could feel you thinking.”

Maggie barely held back the snort, knowing Danvers was nervous enough already.

In all honesty, Maggie was too.

After all this was the first time in  _ weeks _ that she would get an update on  _ her case _ , the case that that god damn organization stole from her when it was pretty much solved. So she hoped that the Lane woman would have good news for them.

Maybe they would get to go home soon…

For some reason she wasn’t as excited about the prospect of going home as she used to be.

Did she miss her job and her life? Absolutely. But she’d also kind of gotten used to the little routine Alex and her had now.

She had gotten used to waking up early on weekends to the sound of the damn fire alarm and cooking for two and Danvers’ not-so-surprisingly great voice as she hummed while ‘helping’ Maggie cook and sharing the blanket with someone while watching shitty movies every night- granted, Alex would end up stealing it almost every time. She had gotten used to sharing the bed with someone and even to the  _ ridiculous _ pillow wall.

And she knew that it all sounded awfully domestic and that she shouldn’t probably be as calm about it but with Danvers it just felt…  _ right _ .

It had only been a couple of weeks but she knew she was going to miss it when she got home into her empty apartment.

She was pulled out of her thoughts as a black SUV pulled up into the empty parking lot.

“Always right on time,” Danvers muttered, her face illuminated by the screen of her phone.

Maggie tried to ignore the flutter in her stomach when she noticed how adorably red Danvers’ nose had gotten.

She turned her attention back to the car. The door swung open and Maggie watched a woman get out of the car and pretty much fucking  _ strut _ over to them.

Danvers gave her a curt nod once she stopped in front of them. “Luce.”

“Don’t be too excited, Danvers.”

Danvers sighed, rubbing her eyes, “I’m sorry I just-“

“I know,” Lane cut her off. “Good to see you again though.”

“Yeah,” Danvers nodded, a small smile on her lips and the thing that Maggie felt in her chest in that moment was definitely not jealousy.

Lane stuck her hand out in Maggie’s direction, waiting for her to grab it. “Major Lucy Lane.”

Maggie hoped the woman couldn’t tell how impressed she was with how firm her handshake was.

“Detective Maggie Sawyer.”

“Okay as much as I would love to chat with you ladies my butt is freezing and Winn can only keep the cameras turned off for so long.”

Maggie glanced at Danvers, expecting her to have her stone cold agent face on. She didn’t though. Instead she just looked worried, scared almost. And Maggie had to fight the urge to reach out and hold her hand and tell her that it was going to be alright.

“Please tell me you have good news, Lane.”

“Not really,” Lane shook her head. “We haven’t been able to locate Lillian and that means we can’t arrest Lord yet without alerting CADMUS.”

“Fuck,” Danvers breathed.

“We’re working on it though-“

“Working on it?” Maggie cut her off, anger rising in her chest. “You took  _ my _ case when it was pretty much solved, claiming that you would do better job at arresting them because I lacked resources and now you’re telling me you can’t even  _ find  _ Lillian?”

“I know you’re probably angry, Detective-“

“Oh you think so?”

“But we’re doing what we can. No one’s seen Lillian since that meeting she had with Max, the one you managed to record.”

“Shit,” Maggie breathed.

“We have some agents undercover at Lord Tech but they haven’t reported anything about project Medusa. It almost seems like they took a break from it…”

Danvers frowned. “Took a break from it? Why would they do that?”

“Luthor is a smart woman and that bastard Lord knows we wouldn’t let him go so easily this time. Maybe Detective’s snooping made them realize they weren’t being too careful,” Lane shrugged, “and so they decided to take a break. Wait for things to quiet down a little.”

“That doesn’t seem like Lillian,” Danvers shook her head. “She’s not the kind of person that would hide. She doesn’t care about the consequences as long as she gets what she wants!”

“I know,” Lane nodded. “I know it makes no sense but we’re doing all we can, Alex. You have to trust me.”

“I know,” Danvers sighed. “I do, I just-“

“Yeah, I know. Don’t worry she’s okay.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes.”

“But what if-“

“Damn it, Danvers. You know J’onn wouldn’t let anything happen to her. You two are like his daughters he-“

“I  _ know _ ,” Maggie had never heard her sound so defeated. “I just couldn’t live with myself if something happened to her.”

Lane reached out and squeezed Danvers’ shoulder comfortingly.

Maggie was pretty sure they were talking about Supergirl. The way Danvers seemed to care about her seemed much deeper than just friendship. But Danvers had told her that she wasn’t dating Supergirl. As far as Maggie was concerned though, Alex thought that she was straight. Maybe she had feelings for her without even knowing about them…

“I’ll be back in two weeks with another update,” Lane said and with a nod she was walking back to her car, leaving the two of them standing there.

Maggie pretended that she didn’t see Danvers wipe her eyes.

~ ~ ~

She took her time in the shower that night. Her mind racing as she stood under the spray of warm water.

The DEO’s made no progress. Lillian was nowhere to be found. Max wasn’t doing anything suspicious.

Thousands of lives were at stake. Thousands of lives and no one knew what to do to find Lillian, to stop her. Thousands of lives and she wasn’t doing anything, just enjoying a warm shower after a long winter walk.

She hadn’t felt this angry and hopeless in a very long time.

Getting out of the shower and into the pajamas felt like forever and she was ready to crash. When she walked into the bedroom though, sleep was the last thing on her mind.

Because Alex was sitting there on their bed, and the light was off but Maggie could see that her eyes were red and puffy, a crumpled tissue in her hand, her knees pulled up to her chest. Maggie had never seen her like this, so small and vulnerable, every bit of the badass agent seemingly gone.

“Hey,” she said, keeping her voice as soft as she could, as she sat down on her side of the bed, as close as she could with the pillows between them.

“Maggie don’t, I just-“

“You don’t have to talk to me if you don’t want to. But, uh, I’m here for you, okay? Plus pushing your emotions down is the worst thing you could possibly do so…”

She waited a moment, watching as Alex’s jaw clenched and unclenched, her fingers fiddling with the tissue.

“I’m just,” she sighed, closing her eyes. “I’m scared.”

Alex’s voice cracked on the last word and Maggie couldn’t just sit there and watch her like that. She grabbed the pillows that were stacked between them and threw them to the floor, shuffling closer to her. Danvers looked at her with wide, teary eyes for a moment before she let herself lean into Maggie.

Maggie shifted a little so that Alex’s head was on her chest, one of her hands rubbing soothing circles into her back, holding her as close as she could with the other one. She felt just as much as heard the sob that escaped Alex’s mouth.

“It’s okay,” she said, leaning her cheek against the top of Danvers’ head. “You’re okay.”

“But, but, but what if- what if  _ she’s _ not gonna be,” Alex’s voice was muffled against Maggie’s chest. “I should be there, Maggie. I should- I should be protecting her, making sure that she’s okay. What if something happens to her?”

Damn, okay Maggie had no idea how this woman didn’t know that she was head over heels for Supergirl.

“Nothing’s gonna happen to her,” Maggie said, trying to keep her voice as soothing as she could. “I promise.”

“But you don’t know that,” Alex shook her head but didn’t pull away from Maggie. “I can’t even begin to imagine what my life without Kara would be like.”

Wait. Kara? Wasn’t that the sister? Holy shit did that mean that the sister was-

_ Focus, Sawyer. _

“Alex,” she said, pulling back a little so Danvers would look at her. “Your sister’s gonna be okay, alright? I promise.”

“You can’t promise that, though.”

“Yeah, I can.”

Danvers shook her head. “You’re so full of shit, Sawyer.”

She pulled back completely then, to blow her nose, and Maggie tried to ignore how she instantly missed the feeling of having Alex in her arms.

She lied down, expecting Danvers to go and pick up the pillows so she could build that fucking wall again. She didn’t though. Instead she just shuffled closer to Maggie, looking at her with wide eyes.

“You wanna talk?” Maggie asked, breaking the silence.

Danvers shook her head and Maggie’s heart dropped a little.

“Not now,” she said. “I just… It feels too raw now. Maybe tomorrow?”

Maggie nodded. “Okay.”

She expected Danvers to at least shuffle to the edge of the bed then, or turn around. But she didn’t. She stayed there, looking at her and Maggie could almost hear her thinking.

“Danvers?”

“Hmm?”

“I can hear your wheels turning.”

“I’m sorry.”

“No, don’t apologize just… what is it?”

Danvers shook her head. “It’s stupid.”

“No, come on. I’m sure it’s not.”

She bit her lip and drew in a deep breath and Maggie couldn’t help herself but notice how utterly gorgeous she was even with her eyes all puffy from crying.

Alex took in a deep breath and opened her mouth and Maggie thought she was finally going to say something. But she just breathed out and instead of saying anything moved even closer to Maggie.

Maggie could feel her heart in her throat as Danvers moved the hand that Maggie had on her chest away and laid her head there.

She hoped Alex couldn’t hear how hard her heart was beating.

“I’m sorry,” Danvers pulled back suddenly. “This okay?”

“Yeah, no, yeah,” Maggie cringed at how high her voice was. “You’re good, Alex.”

“Okay,” she nodded, nestling back into Maggie. “I just need to… you know.“

It wasn’t a question but Maggie nodded anyway. “Yeah,” she breathed, bringing the arm that wasn’t trapped under Alex around her, holding her close.

“Thanks.”

“Of course, Alex.”

She didn’t let herself fall asleep right away, even though she was exhausted. She waited for Alex to fall asleep first, and even when the other woman’s breathing evened out, she still didn’t let her eyes shut.

She just couldn’t.

Her mind was racing and her heart thumping like crazy and her stomach fluttered every time Alex clutched Maggie’s shirt tighter or pulled her closer in her sleep.

And she had no idea when she had started thinking about her as Alex but she knew that every time she did her stomach did that weird flip floppy thing and her heart sped up just a little bit.

She didn’t know how or when but as she was lying there, Alex sleeping in her arms, she was hit with the realization that she was catching feelings. Fast. And with nowhere to run from them- from  _ Alex _ \- well, she was pretty sure that she was fucked.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know this took me longer than i said it would and i'm so sorry!! life's really been so busy lately... idk when i'm gonna post the next chapter cause i'd love to finish We'll be just fine and i also signed up for the secret summer crush thing so... i swear i'll do my best tho!!
> 
> please lemme know what you think (your comments are honestly what makes me write and i love reading what y'all think) in the comments or come talk to me on tumblr, [peggycarterislife](http://peggycarterislife.tumblr.com/) or on twitter, [@pcarterislife](https://twitter.com/pcarterislife)


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know it's been sooo long since i've updated (nearly 3 monhts???) and i am SO SORRY but i've been terribly busy... anyways i hope this is worth the wait!
> 
> (how much are you gonna hate me if i tell you i've had this written for like 3 weeks?? oops...)

She wasn’t cold. That was the first thing she noticed when she woke up. In fact she was warm and comfortable for the first time in what felt like ages. It took a moment for her brain to process everything, to remember last night’s events.

Her head hurt from the crying and she knew her eyes would be still a little puffy when she opened them. But she didn’t really care about that. The only thing that she could think about- besides the fact that her little sister was still potentially in danger and there was nothing she could do about it- was that she had a god damn meltdown in front of Maggie.

But Maggie hadn’t seemed to care. She had helped Alex calm to down and listened to her even though most of it must’ve sounded like total nonsense to her. And then she had just held her until Alex stopped crying and didn’t push her to talk about it and then she held Alex as she fell asleep and-

_ Fuck. _

Maggie held her as she fell asleep.

And Alex didn’t even have to open her eyes to know that Maggie was  _ still _ holding her. No wonder she didn’t get cold, she could feel Maggie’s warm body pressed against her back, her hand around Alex’s waist, holding her tightly, almost protectively.

Maybe if she didn’t open her eyes it would all just go away. Maybe if she just laid there and didn’t move she wouldn’t have to get up and face the day, and Maggie. Or maybe she should get up now, while Maggie was still asleep, sneak out of the room and pray that Maggie wouldn’t bring it up.

The latter seemed more reasonable even though getting up felt like the last thing that Alex wanted to do. Because as stressful as lying in Maggie’s arms, and the possibility of what it could mean was, she was also so warm and comfortable and her body was buzzing with that same feeling she got whenever Maggie leaned against her while watching the TV, or so much as touched her, or whenever she was in the same room as Alex, really.

That thought was all it took for Alex to finally open her eyes and disentangle herself from Maggie, careful not to wake her. She tried to be as quiet as she could as she walked out of the room and closed the door behind her, heading to the kitchen. She needed to get some caffeine into her system before she could really start thinking about any of this.

Once she had her cup of coffee, she sat down at the kitchen table, her phone in her hand. She took a gulp of the coffee, wincing a little at how hot it was, before she took a deep breath and unlocked the phone, going straight for the browser.

She stared at the empty search bar for a couple of minutes, a part of her telling her that there was no reason to do this, that what Maggie was making her feel was purely platonic. But then there was the other part of her, the part that knew very well that she hadn’t felt like this about anyone in a really long time, the part that knew that she’d felt the same way about her best friend Vicky all those years ago.

And as much as she wanted to listen to the part of her that was screaming at her that there had to be a rational explanation for all of this, that it didn’t necessarily mean that she was… gay, she was tired. After a month of constantly asking herself the same question, of being on edge all the time, she was just tired. She wasn’t used to not knowing things, to being unsure about things. Especially when it came to herself.

She was tired and terrified but she needed answers.

So she tapped the empty search bar and typed the words that had been on her mind for what felt like ages now, the words that kept her up at night and that made her build that ridiculous wall of pillows between herself and Maggie as if it would change anything.

She typed ‘ _ Am I gay?’  _ and held her breath as she waited for the search results.

~ ~ ~

She was on her third cup of coffee and she still had no clear answer. Honestly she had no idea what she had been expecting. If she couldn’t answer the question herself, expecting google to answer it for her was probably kind of stupid.

But she was desperate.

Desperate enough to spend more than half an hour taking all the quizzes she could find, even though it was useless since she got a different answer on almost every single one- the slight pang of something that felt an awful lot like disappointment whenever any of the quizzes said she was straight didn’t go unnoticed though.

She clicked on another article as she sipped on her now cold coffee.

_ If you had to google it, I think we both know the answer is pretty clear… _

The voice inside her head sounded too much like Lucy when she read that sentence and that was enough to make her close the article and move onto another one. Even though not so deep inside she knew there was no reason for her wasting time reading these.

_ We both know the answer is pretty clear… _ her inner Lucy voice reminded her.

She rubbed her eyes tiredly and then drank the last of her coffee, deciding to make a fresh pot for Maggie. She locked her phone, her mind was buzzing and she needed to process everything she had read, needed to make sense of it all and then finally come to some sort of a conclusion.

~ ~ ~

Alex wasn’t there when she woke up. Maggie hadn’t expected her to be but that didn’t do anything to quell the slight pang of disappointment in her gut. Grabbing a hoodie from the closet and pulling it on, she glanced at the clock and headed to the kitchen. It was still pretty early but Alex was usually back from her run at this time, trying not to set off the fire alarm while she made scrambled eggs or pancakes.

But the fire alarm was quiet and she couldn’t hear Alex moving around in the kitchen either. The house smelled of fresh coffee though so she made her way to the kitchen, finding Ale- Danvers leaning against the countertop, frowning at her phone- and Maggie wanted to strangle the part of herself that just had to notice how adorable that crinkle between Alex’s-  _ no _ \- Danvers’ eyes was.

She was still wearing her pajamas, which meant that she didn’t go for a run. And it was either because she’d finally decided to admit that it was too cold for her, or because of that thing that made her frown so deep and concentrate so hard she still hadn’t noticed Maggie.

She cleared her throat after a moment, wanting to let Danvers know that she was there without startling her. She didn’t expect Danvers to straighten up so fast Maggie was sure she gave herself a whiplash and then pretty much throw her phone across the room.

“Maggie! Hi! Good morning!”

Her voice was high and her eyes wide and Maggie didn’t need to be a detective to know that something was wrong. Maybe she was freaked out about last night, about letting Maggie see her so vulnerable.

“You okay?”

“Me?” Danvers pointed at herself, scoffing. “Yes, of course I’m okay! Why, uh, why wouldn’t I be? I’m great!”

Maggie frowned. She had no idea what was going on but she’d never seen Danvers act this oddly cheerful so it couldn’t be good.

“Coffee?” Danvers asked. “I made you a fresh pot.”

“Sure,” Maggie nodded and walked over to the table to sit down.

She watched as Danvers poured the still steaming hot coffee, wondering whether she should ask her what was going on or at least say something about last night. But she had never seen her like that.

Danvers wasn’t an overly secretive person, she would tell Maggie about her sister and their strange group of friends, and her idiot subordinates and even some of her past missions. But Maggie knew that Danvers didn’t trust easily, that even though she did tell her stuff, it was mostly stuff that didn’t really matter. Alex was the kind of person that liked to keep everyone, but those few lucky people, at an arm’s length. Maggie understood that, she did. But that was what made it even harder to wrap her brain around last night.

She had never seen Alex so emotional, so vulnerable, and she knew there were only a few people who had seen her like that and lived to tell the tale.

So Maggie had no idea if she should ask her or just keep her mouth shut.

“There you go,” said Danvers as she placed a mug filled with coffee in front of Maggie, taking a seat opposite of her.

“Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me for something so gross, Sawyer.”

Maggie smirked. “At least I won’t get diabetes, Miss ‘I won’t drink my coffee until I put half a bag of sugar in it’.”

Danvers just flipped her off, giving her that glare that would have any DEO agent running. But Maggie just gave her the sweetest smile she could muster before sipping on her coffee.

“Why didn’t you go for a run?” Maggie asked.

Danvers frowned. “How do you know?”

Maggie let her eyes run over Alex’s pajamas, cocking an eyebrow. “The pajamas, Danvers.”

“Oh, yeah, um, right,” Danvers stammered, her eyes wide. “I guess it’s gotten a little too cold for me.”

“DEO’s finest can’t stand a little bit of cold?”

“Oh, fuck off,” Danvers frowned but Maggie could see the smile in her eyes.

They sat in silence after that, and even though it wasn’t outright uncomfortable, Maggie could feel the tension between them. She watched as Danvers played with her fingers, stopping every couple of seconds, clearly nervous but trying not to show it. Maggie sipped on her coffee and wondered how Danvers would react if she asked her about what was on her mind.

“You hungry?” Danvers asked, breaking the silence.

Maggie knew that she was only asking her to occupy herself, so she wouldn’t have to sit there, close to Maggie, and think about whatever it was she was thinking about.

And Maggie hated when people tried to pry stuff out of her so she tried to not to do it to other people herself- unless they found themselves in her interrogation room, of course. But she couldn’t get the picture of Alex crying in her arms out of her head, the picture of Alex cuddling up into her side, basically asking her to hold her.

She didn’t want to pry but she had to at least try and see if Danvers wanted to talk.

So she shook her head. “Not really, thanks.”

“You sure? I could make you that gross double toasted bagel that you love so much,” said Danvers, she smiled and cocked an eyebrow and Maggie had to try  _ really  _ hard to ignore the butterflies in her stomach.

“Yeah, I’m sure,” she nodded.

Danvers frowned then, obviously noticing the slight shift in the atmosphere. “Is everything all right?” she asked.

“That’s what I wanted to ask you.”

Alex’s eyes widened a little. “If this is about last night- I, I’m sorry if I overstepped, Maggie,” she said, fiddling with her fingers again. “I know I probably shouldn’t have-“

“Alex,” Maggie cut her off. Alex’s eyes grew even wider as Maggie reached across the table and covered Alex’s hands with her own, stilling her fingers. “You didn’t do anything you need to apologize for. I just wanted to ask you if you’re okay.”

Alex didn’t say anything, just sat there, blinking dumbly, her hands unmoving beneath Maggie’s.

“We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to, okay?” Maggie said, giving Alex’s hands a little squeeze.

Danvers nodded. She chewed on the inside of her cheek for a moment, her eyes downcast, before she looked up at Maggie. “Remember when I told you that I’d stuck gum in my sister’s hair?”

Maggie nodded. She wasn’t really sure why Alex would bring that up now but she did.

“She was just  _ so  _ annoying.”

Maggie didn’t say anything, just sat there, waiting for Danvers to continue.

“She’d been with us for only a couple of weeks then, not more than three. And she kept following me  _ everywhere _ . Even to that stupid date with Ricky at the beach,” she said, chuckling and shaking her head a little. “One day I had my best friend over, and we were talking in my room, which was suddenly also Kara’s room and I just wanted to be  _ alone _ with Vicky for a moment… Kara wouldn’t leave us alone though. So I stuck gum in her hair. I was hoping she’d leave us to go and try to take it out…”

Alex paused for a moment, chewing the inside of her cheek again.

“She did leave,” Alex said. “But after Vicky left I found her crying in the bathroom, the gum all over her hair. I was a terrible sister…”

“You were a kid.”

Alex shook her head. “No, that doesn’t excuse the way I treated her,” she said. “Back then I would try anything to get rid of her. Having to share  _ everything _ with her seemed like the worst thing ever back then… I keep thinking about all the times I pushed her away and how badly I treated her. Now though… I- it’s so hard to not be  _ there _ for her, you know? To not be there whenever she needs me and to make sure that she’s okay.”

“I’m sure she’ll be fi-“

“I’m her big sister though. I’m supposed to protect her.”

Maggie hadn’t been sure last night, hadn’t really had time to think about it last night. But now she was absolutely certain that Doctor Doctor Special Agent Alex Danvers was also Supergirl’s big sister and the most ridiculous person Maggie’s ever met.

Maggie could pretty much feel her brain exploding with the new realization and she  _ really  _ wanted to tell Danvers that she knew, to show her how great of a Detective she really was. And she wanted to tell her that her little sister would be okay, that she was sure the DEO would stop Lillian and Max before they could hurt anyone.

But Alex was upset. And Maggie was sure that if she told her that she had figured out her little sister’s secret identity, Alex would freak out.

So she just tilted her head to the side, catching Alex’s eyes with her own. “Listen, I’m sure that Lane would let you know if anything was up with her.”

Maggie suppressed the smile that tugged on her lips when she saw the crinkle between Alex’s eyes appear.

“And I’m also pretty sure that she knows you’d kill her if anything were to happen to Kara,” Maggie paused a little, getting a small nod from Danvers. “Nothing’s gonna happen to your sister, okay? She’ll be fine.”

Danvers chewed on the inside of her cheek for a moment. “I hope so,” she sighed.

“Well,” Maggie smiled softly, “if she’s anything like her sister, I know she will.”

Maggie couldn’t ignore the butterflies in her stomach when Alex pulled one of her hands from under hers and put it on top of Maggie’s, a small, grateful smile on her lips even though her eyes were shining with tears.

~ ~ ~

Alex didn’t necessarily hate her new job, she just didn’t like it very much. There was a reason why she was a DEO agent and not a nanny. Even though she liked kids, having to be stuck in a classful of teenagers for half a day, five days a week, was a little too much for her.  Not that any of the kids dared to say a word that wasn’t related to the lesson’s topic- after all there was also a reason why one look from her could make any DEO agent tremble with fear.

The job was just a little too mundane for her.

She craved adrenaline. Needed the rush of excitement and nerves she got whenever she worked in the lab and time was suddenly ticking away way too quickly. She missed that feeling that rushed through her whenever she had the opportunity to wipe the floor with another cocky rookie.

She needed all of that to feel alive.

God, she missed her job.

(The level of admiration she had for people who actually did this for a living was higher than ever before.)

But this also wasn’t the worst thing.

Both Maggie and her had regular working hours- which was another thing they both weren’t really used to- and finished at the same time so they drove home together every day. Maggie usually cooked dinner for the two of them, letting Alex help her even with things more complicated than chopping vegetables if the dish was easy enough. And after dinner they would curl up on that small shitty couch and watch whatever was on TV.

The thought of Maggie and their little routing managed to make even the slowest of days pass a little faster for some reason.

Alex glanced at the clock, noticing that it was only a couple of minutes till she could head home. Just enough time to get through the last couple of exams that she had left on her ‘to grade’ pile. She smiled, knowing that she wouldn’t have to take any of them home and that she could just enjoy another quiet evening in with Maggie.

She tried to suppress the fluttering in her stomach that she felt at the thought.

Maggie was her friend and Alex was… probably just confused. She hadn’t really had a close friend- except for her kid sister, of course- since high school, since she never really had the time or desire to make friends. But she had to spend time with Maggie. And, coincidentally, she really enjoyed it. But that didn’t necessarily mean that Alex was attracted to her in any way.

(She couldn’t deny that Maggie was  _ really  _ hot though. After all she wasn’t blind.)

She just liked hanging out with Maggie and liked making Maggie laugh and felt really comfortable around her and apparently didn’t have trouble being vulnerable around her.

That didn’t make her gay though.

Did it?

Because as much as Alex was dreading it, she couldn’t deny that fluttery thing her heart did whenever she so much as looked at Maggie, or that flip-floppy thing her stomach did whenever Maggie touched her or let Alex rest her head against her shoulder while watching a movie or made sure to pull a blanket around them because she knew that Alex got cold-

Her thoughts were interrupted by a soft knock on the door. “Mrs. Knight?”

She looked up from the exam she had honestly forgotten that she was grading, to see one of her students- Bianca?- standing in the doorway. Alex wasn’t great with names and she never put much effort into remembering them.

(Back when she was beginning to work at the DEO she used to learn all the names. But the longer she worked there, the more agents she watched die. And it only got harder when she got promoted to a higher rank. So she just stopped learning all the names. It didn’t really make losing an agent easier, but it didn’t hurt as much.)

Another reason why she liked this job was because the kids never bothered her. They all always ran out of the classroom as soon as the bell rang.

So this- Becky?- kid talking to her after school was new.

She cleared her throat and straightened up in her chair. “Yes?”

“Can I talk to you about, uh, something?” she asked, her voice small.

So much for not having to take any work home.

“Sure,” Alex nodded and stood up from her chair, walked around her table and leaned against it.

She watched as- Becca? yeah, Alex was pretty sure that was her name- walked over to her slowly, wringing her hands nervously. She wondered what Becca wanted to talk to her about that would make her this nervous. Even though Alex didn’t remember the names of most of her students, she remembered how each of them did in class and Becca was one of her best students.

“It’s kind of… personal,” she said, her voice small.

Alex watched as Becca crossed her arms over her chest and looked at her with big, scared eyes and she could feel her big sister instinct taking over. “What is it?”

Becca looked at her with wide eyes and then blurted out: “You’re gay, right?”

Alex’s eyebrows rose in shock and she had to swallow the firm ‘ _ No.’ _ that nearly made its way past her lips the moment she heard the question.

“I-I, um, I’m sorry if this is too personal and totally inappropriate but I didn’t know who else to talk to because the school counselor isn’t the best person to talk to and my friends, well… And, and people talk, you know? And I heard- so I thought- but now that I’ve actually asked it out loud I heard how inappropriate that was and I am  _ so  _ sorry! I just didn’t know-“

“Hey,” Alex stopped her ramble after she managed to snap out of the initial shock somehow. She put on the best smile she could muster in that moment even though her heart was beating like crazy because this kid clearly needed someone to talk to and for some reason thought that Alex would be a good choice. “No, it’s uh, it’s okay.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, don’t worry about it, Becca,” the name slipped out without her even realizing and she prayed that she didn’t get it wrong. But after a beat of silence she figured she got it right. “And, um, yes. Yeah, I am, uh- gay.”

Alex had never in her life had to try so hard to get a word out of her mouth.

She tried to ignore how strangely good it felt to say it in that context.

Becca nodded and took a deep breath and Alex could see how hard getting the next couple of words out was for her and had to ignore how much it reminded her of herself. “If you don’t mind me asking… How did you, uh, know?”

Alex didn’t become DEO’s best agent just like that. She had to be great in quite literally everything. Even improvising and lying. And she was great, the best. She never had trouble talking her way out of things. There was never a single undercover mission that she’d messed up, always managing to lie perfectly. Even with a gun trained at her head.

But now, with this wide-eyed teenage girl standing in front of her, the question still ringing in her ears, she couldn’t get her brain to string a coherent enough answer.

_ If I knew how I wouldn’t have spent the past three days googling articles and shitty quizzes, kid. _

“I just, well, I tried looking it up online. But, I don’t know if you’ve ever seen any of those articles, there’s nothing helpful,” Becca sighed.

Alex had read them all at least  _ twice _ in the span of 72 hours. She knew.

“There’s also these quizzes, but they’re not really helpful either…”

Alex wasn’t a religious person but if there was hell, she was pretty sure she was in it then.

This kid was honestly standing there, all wide-eyes and trembling hands, actually expecting Alex to have answers to all of her questions. The same questions Alex had been asking herself for the past 3 days… or if she was being honest for over a month now. The same questions that kept Alex up at night and made her build that ridiculous pillow wall and spend  _ hours _ on google. The same questions Alex had no idea how to answer.

“Mrs. Knight?”

“Yeah, um, sorry,” Alex smiled apologetically and rubbed her eyes tiredly. “Well, uh, when you know you just know, you know?”

Alex cringed at the sentence that came out of her mouth and tried to remember what any of the countless articles said.

“But what if I don’t know?”

Alex frowned, chewing on the inside of her cheek. She’d been trying to answer that question for  _ so long _ now. But no matter how hard she tried she just couldn’t and it was making her so angry. She wasn’t used to not having the answers.

She was a scientist. No matter how difficult the problem she was dealing with was, there was always an equation that would help her get to the conclusion if she just followed a simple logical process. It was easy and clear and it made actual sense.

Her feelings were anything but clear and didn’t make any sense at all.

If only there was an equation she could use or some test that she could-

“Test it,” she said, a smile spreading across her face.

“What?”

She shrugged. “If you’re not sure, test it.”

“I’m not really sure that’s a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“Because I could make an idiot out of myself in front of someone I really care about.”

“Oh.”

Alex didn’t think about that…

“That’s why I need to be sure about what I’m feeling before I do anything.”

Alex groaned internally. They were back at the beginning. She thought that she’d finally found the perfect solution to the question, without having to tell Becca how she herself  _ knew. _ Alex felt honestly sorry for the girl. It had to have taken a lot of courage to ask Alex. But Alex was useless because she herself didn’t even know if she was gay or not and she couldn’t figure out what she was feeling herself, not to mention helping a teenager figure out what she was feeling.

She’d read possibly every single article there is about questioning one’s sexuality and yet she didn’t even know where to start or what to tell Becca. She couldn’t help her, not when she didn’t even know how to help herself.

But maybe Maggie could…

“I’m sorry but I’m not really an expert on these things,” she said, her heart clenching as she saw Becca’s shoulders sag in defeat. “But, um, my wife kind of is.”

“Yeah?”

Alex nodded. “She works in the library,” she said. “And I’m pretty sure that she’ll be more than happy to talk to you.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

Becca smiled, shuffling slowly to the door. “Thank you, Mrs. Knight.”

~ ~ ~

Alex flopped down onto the couch and took a sip from her beer, waiting for Maggie to come and join her. She didn’t wait long before Maggie appeared in the living room, a bowl of popcorn in one hand and her own bottle of beer in the other. 

“So,” Alex started when Maggie sat down, “how was your day?”

Maggie smiled, deep dimples showing and Alex’s stomach did that  _ annoying _ fluterry thing. “Well, I think I’ve figured out why so many old people work as librarians” she said, grinning proudly as she popped a handful of popcorn into her mouth, frowning thoughtfully as she chewed.

Alex did her best to suppress the smile that was tugging on the corners of her lips. “And why is that?”

“Because time passes  _ much _ slower in the library,” Maggie’s eyes were wide and full of fake horror and Alex couldn’t help herself but laugh. “They’re basically just delaying the inevitable…”

“You’re ridiculous.” Alex didn’t even finish the sentence before she had a couple of pieces of popcorn bouncing off of her face. “Hey!”

“I’m being serious here, Danvers,” she said, taking a sip of her beer. “This actually explains the rumors about our town librarian when I was a kid… She really was 150 years old.”

Alex just shook her head, an amused smile on her lips. “It can’t be that bad.”

“Oh you have  _ no _ idea.”

“You’re being dramatic.”

“When we get back I’m gonna kill the person who came up with this. I don’t even care what the punishment for killing a federal agent is.”

“Oh, you’re being  _ so  _ dramatic.”

Maggie just shook her head and took a sip of her beer. “Will you come visit me when I’m in prison?” she asked after a while.

“You’re unbearable.”

“Oh come on,” Maggie nudged, grinning, her dimples in full force. “We both know you’d miss me too much not to visit.”

Alex took a long swig of her beer. Because yes. If Maggie were to- hypothetically- go to prison, Alex would miss her. She had become so used to seeing Maggie every day, to spending so much time with her. Prison or no prison, Alex knew that she was going to miss her.

Alex wondered if Maggie would be up for hanging out every now and then when all this was over. She hoped she would. Because Alex didn’t even want to think about not seeing Maggie ever again.

“Come on,” Maggie nudged her again and Alex almost spilled some of her beer as she pulled the bottle away from her lips, “admit it.”

“Admit what?”

“That you’d miss me.”

Alex squinted her eyes, trying to keep her cool as Maggie tilted her head and her smile got even wider- and dimples somehow  _ deeper _ \- and her heart started to race like crazy. Her throat felt all dry and tight so she took another swig of her beer before talking. “I, uh- I mean, um, yeah,” she shrugged, trying to play it as cool as she could. “I guess I would.”

“Aww,” Maggie tilted her head to the other side and poked Alex in the ribs- and Alex was honestly proud that she managed not to yelp at that. “You’re so getting soft on me.”

“I’m not,” Alex scoffed. Her tone sounded unconvincing even to her own ears. “I’d just feel sorry for how truly stupid you are to get yourself a life sentence for something like that.”

Maggie whined overdramatically, throwing her head back against the couch. “But you have no idea how bad it is! You at least get to… do stuff!”

“It’s not at all that exciting, trust me.”

“The highlight of my librarian career was helping a kid find a book, of which the name I don’t even remember anymore.”

Alex grinned- Maggie honestly made it so easy sometimes- and took a sip of her beer. “Putting those detective skills to good use I see.”

“Oh, fuck off.”

Alex had to suppress a smile at the cute scowl on Maggie’s face. She watched as Maggie turned on the TV and kicked her feet up on the coffee table, crossing her arms over her chest, the scowl still in place and Alex couldn’t help herself but smile a little.

She turned her attention to the TV then, trying to concentrate to whatever was on. But she couldn’t. Because the only thing she could concentrate on was the highlight of her teaching career, the girl who had come out to her, the one she had been absolutely no help to. The one she had told to go see Maggie for any gay advice.

“A girl kinda came out to me today,” she said, her eyes still trained on the TV.

She didn’t have to look to know that Maggie’s eyes were trained on her the moment the words had left her mouth. “What?”

“Well, she wanted advice… asked me how I  _ knew _ .”

“What’d you tell her?”

Alex still wasn’t looking at Maggie. “I told her that when you know that you know you just know, you know?”

“Are you having a stroke, Danvers?”

She sure felt like she was.

Alex took a deep breath and finally met Maggie’s eyes. “I panicked,” she shrugged.

“So you just told her…  _ that _ ?”

“And then I also told her to, uh,” Alex cleared her throat, unsure if what she was about to say wasn’t offensive in some way, “test it…”

Maggie’s eyes went wide. “Test it?”

Well fuck. She shouldn’t have said that. Maggie was looking at her with wide eyes and raised eyebrows and unreadable face and Alex was sure that what she’d said had to be homophobic in some way.

_ Way to go, Danvers. _

“Uh, yes?”

She expected Maggie to be mad or to try to explain it to her or a combination of both. She didn’t expect her to start laughing.

“Why, uh, why are you- I- what?”

“You really said that?”

“I- yes?”

“Oh my god, Danvers,” Maggie laughed, wiping at the corners of her eyes. “You’re the worst ba- fake gay ever. Also such a nerd.”

“I panicked.”

“I know. Poor kid though…”

She did feel bad for giving the kid such bad advice. She’d probably feel worse if she wasn’t so busy feeling bad for herself and trying to figure out the answers to all of the questions she had though.

“I also kind of told her to go see you,” Alex said. “To, uh, you know, get some real gay advice.”

“Real gay advice,” Maggie echoed, deep dimples making appearance. “Well, if she stops by I might reconsider killing that agent out of boredom.”

“Look at you being all mature, Sawyer.”

“Oh, shut up, Danvers,” Maggie nudged her, settling back into the couch and turning her attention to the TV.

Any retort that Alex had died in her throat the moment she felt Maggie’s head on her shoulder, the scent of Maggie’s shampoo surrounding her. Her heart started beating like crazy again and her stomach did that annoying fluttery thing and she was painfully aware of her whole body. And she knew that in theory she should hate the feeling, because there was nothing good about it. But she didn’t. Because just the thought of Maggie sitting up straight again had a slight pang of disappointment filling her stomach.

So as she sat there- trying not to move or not to take deep breaths so she wouldn’t jostle Maggie- trying to pay attention to the TV even though all her brain could process was Maggie, she realized two things.

One, she wouldn’t get the answer to any of her questions if she kept denying things. So she promised herself that she would stop pushing down all the things that she felt around Maggie and instead start thinking about what they meant.

And two, testing things wasn’t for everyone. And yes, it was probably a really bad advice for a teenager. But Alex had a fake wife- a fake wife that she was possibly developing feelings for. So what better way to figure out if those possible feelings were real, than letting herself be a bit more affectionate with Maggie- for the sake of keeping their cover, of course.

Alex was sick and tired of those same questions not letting her sleep for weeks.

She was going to figure this out.                                                     

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> again, i am sorry for taking so long but uh.. life? and i don't know when i'm gonna update next but i swear i'll do my best!!
> 
> also i swear i'm gonna reply to all of your lovely comments soon!! i've been really fucking busy... i'm sorry!!
> 
> please lemme know what you think (your comments are honestly what makes me write and i love reading what y'all think) in the comments or come talk to me on tumblr, [peggycarterislife](http://peggycarterislife.tumblr.com/) or on twitter, [@pcarterislife](https://twitter.com/pcarterislife)

**Author's Note:**

> i'm back!! and would love to know what y'all think about this, if i should continue it or nah... so please, leave a comment or come talk to me on tumblr, [peggycarterislife](http://peggycarterislife.tumblr.com/)
> 
> s/o to my amazing pal and beta [@detectivedanvrs](https://twitter.com/detectivedanvrs), goo check out her work [TheAwkwardLonelyBear](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheAwkwardLonelyBear)


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